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iFrom  \\\t  Ethraru  nf 

X\\t  Htbrarg  of 
Prtttrrtnn  SIjMtogtral  S^^mtnarQ 


BR  85  .C6  1899 

Coe,  Edward  B.  1842-1914. 

Life  indeed 


Life  Indeed 


Life   Indeed 


BY 


/ 


Edward  B.  Coe 

D.D.,  LL.D. 

Senior  Minister  of  the  Collegiate  Church 
New  York 


That  they  7nay  lay  hold  on  the  life  which  is  life 
indeed. — i  Tim.  vi.   19,  r.  v. 


New  York        Chicago        Toronto 

Fleming  H.  Revell  Company 

Publishers  of  Evangelical  Literature 


Copyright,  1899 

by 

FLEMING  H.  REVELL  COMPANY 


To  my  Friends  in  the  Fifth  Avenue  Collegiate 
Church  who  have  desired  that  this  volume  should 
be  printed,  it  is  affectionately  dedicated,  with  the 
hope  that  others  who  read  it  may  be  led  to  ''  lay 
hold  on  the  life  which  is  life  i?ideed. ' ' 


Contents 

CHAP. 

I.  A  Lost  Faith 

11.  De  Profundis 

III.  God  Wrestling  with  Man     . 

IV.  The  Restoring  of  Souls 
V.  The  Work  of  God 

VI.  Putting  on  Christ 

VII.  The  Practical  Man's  Mistakes 

VIII.  Divine  Restraints 

IX.  In  the  Footsteps  of  Jesus.    . 

X.  Jesus  Asleep  .... 

XL  The    Leadership    of   Little   Chil 

DREN    ..... 

XII.  The  Necessity  of  Immortality 

XIII.  The  Place  and  the  Way 


9 
29 

45 
63 
81 

lOI 

121 
141 
161 

179 

201 
227 
249 


A  LOST  FAITH 


r 


They  have  taken  atvay  my  Lord,  and  I  know 
not  where  they  have  laid  Him. — John  xx.  13. 


A  LOST   FAITH 

The  first  Easter  morning  brought  to  this  poor 
woman  a  sore  disappointment.  She  had  gone  in 
the  early  twiHght  to  the  grave  where  two  days  be- 
fore the  body  of  one  whom  she  had  loved  had  been 
hurriedly  and  secretly  buried.  Her  visit  could  of 
course  do  Him  no  good,  for  He  was  dead.  But 
she  might  at  least,  with  the  spices  that  she  carried, 
complete  the  hurried  embalming,  which  the  ap- 
proach of  the  Jewish  Sabbath  had  perhaps  inter- 
rupted. She  might,  at  any  rate,  sit  near  Him  a 
little  longer,  before  she  must  give  Him  up  forever, 
and  offer  to  Him  the  affectionate  tribute  and  to  her 
own  heart  the  great  relief  of  her  tender  thoughts 
and  her  silent  tears.  The  almost  irresistible  im- 
pulse, which  leads  us  to  cling,  to  the  very  last,  to 
those  whom  we  love,  though  death  has  touched 
them,  drew  her  even  to  the  tomb  of  Him  whom  she 
called  her  Lord. 

It  was  no  ordinary  friendship  which  had  bound 
her  to  Him.  We  know  but  little  of  her  history  and 
we  may  hesitate  to  accept  as  true  all  that  is  told  us 
of  Him.  But  there  is  no  doubt  whatever  of  the 
opinion  concerning  Him  or  of  the  feeling  toward 
Him,  which  prevailed  in  the  little  group  of  persons 
11 


12  Life  Indeed 

to  which  she  belonged.     She  doubtless  believed,  as 
others  did,   certainly,  that  He  had  cured  her  by 
direct,  supernatural  power,  of  a  peculiarly  dreadful 
disease.     She  had  been  more  or  less  in  His  com- 
pany from  that  time  to  this.     She  appears  to  have 
stood  in  intimate  relations  with  His  mother,  and 
with  the  mother  of  two  of  His  disciples.     She  had 
seen   Him    perform  what  appeared  to  her  to  be 
miraculous  acts  of  divine  power.     She  had  heard 
from  Him  words  which  seemed  to  her  to  be  words 
of  divine  authority  and  wisdom.     She  had  felt,  in 
personal   acquaintance,    the   force   of  a  character 
which  was  to  her  the  very  ideal  of  divine  purity 
and  strength  and  gentleness  and  love.     We  some- 
times  turn    the   ancient   and    fragmentary   pages, 
which  tell  us  all  we  know  about  Him,  and  are 
strangely  impressed  by  the  spiritual  depth  of  His 
sayings  and  the  spiritual  beauty  of  His  life.     But 
whatever  He  was,  this  woman  from  the  little  fishing 
town  of  Magdala  had  known  Him  well,  and  she 
believed  that  He  was  the  long-expected  deliverer 
of  her  people,  the  promised  Messiah,  the  Christ  of 
God.     She  may  have  been  wrong  in  this,  but  this 
was  her  belief.      She  may  have  had  but  an  imper- 
fect conception  of  what  He  meant  by  His  language 
concerning  Himself;   she  obviously  did  not  under- 
stand Him  to  have  foretold  His  resurrection ;  but 
He  was  to  her  a  superior  being,  who  had  brought 
into  her  obscure  and  sinful  life  the  glory  of  another 
world. 


A  Lost  Faith  13 

Judge,  then,  of  the  utter  desolation  of  sorrow 
with  which  on  reaching  the  sepulchre  she  found  it 
empty.  Was  it  that  then  for  the  first  time  she 
realized  that  she  had  lost  Him  ?  Not  so,  for  two 
days  before  she  had  seen  Him  die.  She  had  stood, 
with  the  few  faithful  and  loving  ones,  near  the  cross 
on  which  He  had  expired.  She  had  looked,  to  the 
very  end,  for  some  signal  display  of  the  power 
which  she  believed  Him  to  possess,  for  a  triumphal 
vindication  of  the  claims  which  she  knew  Him  to 
have  made.  But  no  help  had  come  from  earth  or 
heaven.  She  had  heard  His  dying  cry,  and  when 
at  last  He  was  taken  down  from  the  cross,  she  saw 
only  too  plainly  that  His  life  was  extinct.  She  had 
witnessed  His  burial,  and  then,  as  she  sat  and 
watched,  while  the  darkness  deepened,  before  His 
closed  and  silent  tomb,  the  terrible  certainty  had 
sunk  into  her  soul  that  all  was  over.  Then  it 
was  that  she  knew  that  He  was  gone  from  her,  and 
that  she  should  never  see  Him  alive  again.  And 
long  before  the  hours  of  the  Sabbath  had  passed 
and  it  began  to  dawn  toward  the  first  day  of  the 
week,  every  ray  of  hope  had  faded  and  left  her  in 
the  stupor  of  inconsolable  grief. 

It  was  not,  then,  a  deeper  sense  of  her  irreparable 
loss,  which  called  out  a  new  flood  of  passionate 
tears,  as  she  came  to  the  sepulchre  and  found  it 
untenanted.  But  she  cherished  even  the  lifeless 
form  from  which  she  could  not  bear  to  part.  It 
was  that  over  which  she  had  gone  to  weep  j  it  was 


14  Life  Indeed 

the  loss  of  that  only  that  had  wrung  from  her  the 
cry,  ''They  have  taken  away  my  Lord."  Surely 
in  His  tomb  He  could  have  done  no  harm.  They 
might  at  least  have  left  Him  to  her  there.  And  so 
she  stood  disconsolate,  in  the  cold  Easter  dawn. 

So  many  a  human  soul  has  stood  by  the  grave 
of  a  dead  faith.  It  was  once  a  living  faith,  and 
full  of  the  joy  and  beauty  and  strength  of  life.  It 
was,  perhaps,  a  faith  in  some  man,  upon  whose 
knowledge  and  judgment  you  had  thought  you 
could  depend.  He  seemed  to  you  to  possess  ample 
sources  of  information,  and  the  industry  and  in- 
telligence to  use  them  wisely.  You  felt  sure  that 
his  opinions  were  not  hastily  formed,  nor  distorted 
by  prejudice,  not  colored  by  selfishness.  He  was 
a  man,  you  supposed,  of  acute  observation,  of  wide 
experience;  and  you  received  his  advice  as  the 
final  settlement  of  the  questions  that  troubled  you. 
But  you  find,  as  you  go  on,  that  he  is  far  from  in- 
fallible. You  buy  a  security  that  he  recommends, 
and  it  tumbles  to  nothing ;  you  put  your  property 
in  his  hands,  and  it  slips  through  his  fingers ;  you 
adopt  a  course  of  study  or  of  action  to  which  he 
has  counseled  you,  and  you  find,  perhaps  too  late, 
that  your  prospects  for  life  are  endangered  or 
ruined.  He  meant  well,  you  say,  if  you  are  just  to 
him ;  you  perhaps  love  him  still  for  the  services  he 
once  did  you  and  for  his  kindly  intentions,  but  you 
sadly  own  that  you  no  longer  believe  in  him  as  a 
clear-sighted  and  cautious  adviser. 


A  Lost  Faith  15 

You  have,  perhaps,  had  a  friend  in  whose  affec- 
tion you  trusted.  You  grew  up  together,  were 
together  at  school  or  at  college,  passed  together 
through  many  trying  vicissitudes  of  life,  and  you 
always  found  him  staunch  and  true.  You  felt  sure 
that  you  could  count  on  him,  whatever  might 
happen;  your  friendship  for  each  other  could 
never  grow  cold.  But  little  by  little  you  drift 
apart,  your  courses  in  life  take  different  directions ; 
other  friends  gather  round  him  and  you  are  left  on 
the  rim  of  an  ever-widening  circle;  till  you  are 
forced  at  last  to  admit  that  his  special  friendship 
for  you  is  dead.  You  do  not  think  of  blaming 
him  for  this.  You  rally  from  it,  perhaps,  and  go 
bravely  and  cheerfully  on  with  your  work,  but  you 
bear  about  for  a  time  a  dull  pain  in  your  heart,  or 
you  carry  the  scar  of  wounded  feeling  forever.  It 
is  an  experience  which  comes  usually  more  than 
once  in  a  lifetime,  but  it  is  a  sad  thing  for  a  man  to 
lose  faith  in  a  friend. 

Or  you  have  trusted  some  one  for  his  character, 
which  seemed  to  you  as  solid  as  the  hills.  His 
very  look  inspired  confidence,  his  name  was  held 
as  a  synonym  of  honor,  his  simple  presence  rebuked 
hypocrisy  and  fraud.  Men  whom  you  knew  to  be 
low  and  mean  instinctively  avoided  him,  and  he 
stood  in  the  community  as  the  type  of  a  pure  and 
upright  man.  He  stands  so  still,  but  you  cannot 
trust  him  as  you  did.  Ugly  stories  are  whispered 
about  his  business  transactions.     Dark  facts  have 


16  Life  Indeed 

come  to  your  knowledge,  which  throw  doubt  on 
his  integrity.  You  look  for  more  complete  dis- 
closures which  will  change  your  doubts  into  cer- 
tainties and  ruin  his  name.  But  you,  meanwhile, 
have  lost  your  faith  in  him.  Well  for  you,  if  you 
have  not  also  lost  your  faith  in  virtue,  truth,  and 
human  nature  itself ! 

Or  perhaps  you  have  given  your  sympathy  and 
aid  to  an  enterprise  which  seemed  to  you  worthy 
of  all  confidence  and  honor.  It  was  full  of  the 
promise  of  beneficent  and  enduring  results.  It 
was  just  what  was  needed  to  accomplish  a  great 
and  desirable  end.  And  so  you  flung  yourself 
heartily  into  it,  with  all  the  enthusiasm  of  your 
nature,  and  you  felt  the  exhilarating  reaction  which 
comes  from  honest  devotion  to  a  noble  cause.  But 
the  effects  that  you  expected  do  not  appear.  The 
evils  that  you  hoped  to  destroy  still  exist ;  the  co- 
operation of  others  is  withdrawn ;  public  sympathy 
deserts  you  ;  and  you  come  at  last  to  the  sad  con- 
clusion that  the  scheme  from  which  you  had  antici- 
pated so  much  is  a  failure.  Nay,  perhaps  as  your 
faith  in  it  dies  away,  you  lose  confidence  in  all  at- 
tempts to  bring  about  any  important  and  general 
improvement  in  society.  You  settle  down  into  the 
gloomy  conviction  that  events  may  as  well  be  left 
to  take  their  course,  that  an  enthusiasm  of  human- 
ity is  a  will-o'-the-wisp. 

Or  it  may  be  a  religious  faith  that  you  are  at 
length  about  to  bury.     It  was  dear  to  you  once. 


A  Lost  Faith  17 

It  is  bound  up  with  memories  of  your  home  and 
your  childhood.  You  learned  its  sacred  names  at 
your  mother's  knee.  Those  whom  you  have  most 
loved  and  honored  have  lived  and  died  in  it,  and 
it  gave  them  a  courage  and  gentleness  and  patience 
and  purity  which  made  their  lives  beautiful,  a  joy 
and  trust  and  serenity  of  spirit  which  made  their 
death  triumphant.  You  have  seen  it  held,  in  va- 
rious degrees  of  intelligent  comprehension  and  of 
moral  earnestness,  by  multitudes  around  you.  On 
some  it  has  seemed  to  exert  no  influence  whatever. 
It  has  been  to  others  the  very  breath  of  a  diviner 
life.  It  has  lifted  the  fallen  to  a  new  manhood  and 
womanhood.  It  has  inspired  the  strong  to  a  self- 
denying  activity.  It  has  held  men  true  under  the 
shock  of  a  great  temptation.  It  has  kept  them 
calm  and  cheerful  under  blow  after  blow  of  calam- 
ity. You  have  observed  the  fruits  of  it,  not  only 
in  individual  characters  which  it  has  renewed  or 
developed,  but  in  organized  effort  for  the  relief  of 
the  suffering,  for  the  rescue  of  the  ruined,  for  the 
spread  of  the  principles  and  the  practice  of  right- 
eousness. To  these  great  undertakings  you  have 
seen  men  giving  their  fortunes  and  their  lives,  not 
for  any  personal  advantage,  but  from  devotion  to 
that  faith,  which  till  lately  was  yours,  and  you 
have  instinctively  honored  them  for  their  loyalty  to 
it.  You  have  looked  over  history  and  have  no- 
ticed that  from  the  first  these  have  been  its  effects. 
It  has,  indeed,  often  been  misunderstood,  its  hold 


18  Life  Indeed 

on  human  nature  has  never  yet  been  complete,  and 
many  a  crime  has  been  committed  in  its  name. 
But  it  has  been  at  least  one  of  the  principal  agen- 
cies in  refining  and  purifying  human  society.  And 
the  more  thoroughly  any  community  has  been  gov- 
erned by  its  principles  and  animated  by  its  spirit, 
the  more  conspicuous  has  been  its  peace  and  prog- 
ress and  virtue. 

You  may  even  have  had  experience  in  yourself 
of  its  beneficent  power.  You  have  sometimes  suf- 
fered a  keen  sense  of  sin,  as  you  have  compared 
your  own  conduct  with  your  consciousness  of  duty 
and  your  ideal  of  character,  and  you  have  felt  a 
great  load  lifted  from  your  conscience  as  your  re- 
ligion has  shown  you  a  God  of  love,  ready  to  for- 
give you  for  the  sake  of  an  atoning  Redeemer. 
You  have  longed  for  communion  with  the  infinite 
Father,  and  you  have  seemed  to  draw  near  to  Him 
in  the  person  of  one  whom  you  believed  to  be  His 
Son.  You  now  think  that  such  communion  was 
all  a  delusion  and  a  fancy,  but  it  had  the  same 
efi"ect  upon  you  in  satisfying  your  highest  aspira- 
tions and  exalting  all  your  spiritual  life,  as  if  it  had 
been  real.  You  have  been  attracted  to  Him, 
through  whom  you  have  thus  come  nearer  to  God, 
not  as  a  man  of  superior  intelligence  and  virtue, 
in  spite  of  an  unaccountable  hallucination  under 
which  He  labored,  but  as  the  very  Word  made 
flesh,  the  divine  mind  and  character  realized  in 
humanity.     He  not  only  revealed   to  you  the  infi- 


A  Lost  Faith  19 

nite  love,  He  bound  you  by  a  loving  devotion  to 
Himself.  He  lifted  you  toward  all  that  is  noblest 
and  best.  You  felt  that  it  was  your  privilege  and 
your  glory  to  serve  Him.  Duty  was  transfigured 
when  it  became  the  offering  of  gratitude  to  Him. 
Sorrow  was  lightened  when  you  thought  of  His  ten- 
der personal  care.  The  discipline  of  life  through 
which  you  were  passing  acquired  a  solemn  but  joy- 
ful meaning,  when  you  looked  forward  to  the  home, 
wherein,  if  you  were  faithful,  you  should  one  day 
see  His  face.  Your  whole  moral  nature  was  broad- 
ened and  purified  by  this  Christian  faith  which 
once  you  held.  You  were  eager  to  proclaim  it, 
you  sought  to  win  others  to  the  acceptance  of  it. 
It  was  the  ground  of  your  deepest  hopes  ;  it  was 
the  inspiration  of  your  highest  activity. 

But  now,  you  say,  you  have  ''given  it  up."  It 
is  dead  already,  and  it  waits  to  be  buried.  Per- 
haps it  is  costing  you  something  to  part  with  it. 
Your  whole  nature  has  been  wrung  and  torn  in  the 
conflict  of  reason  and  feeling  through  which  you 
have  passed.  You  can  mark  the  precise  instant  at 
which  your  struggling  faith  in  the  gospel  expired. 
Perhaps,  on  the  other  hand,  you  do  not  know  what 
has  killed  it.  Its  doctrines  have  one  by  one  lost 
their  hold  upon  you.  Its  threatenings  have  some- 
how ceased  to  alarm  you  as  they  did.  Its  promises 
have  year  by  year  grown  less  alluring  to  your  heart. 
Other  motives  of  action  have  displaced  those 
which  it  offers,  and  these  have  seemed  more  and 


20  Life  Indeed 

more  remote  and  unreal.  The  decay  of  your  faith 
has  been  a  half  conscious  and  gradual  process,  and 
you  have  only  awakened  to  a  knowledge  of  it  when 
it  is  already  too  late,  as  you  think, — when  the  evil, 
if  evil  there  is,  is  done. 

For  it  often  occurs  that  our  religious  beliefs  are 
insensibly  altered  as  the  result  of  simple  indif- 
ference. They  may  not  have  been  seriously  weighed 
at  the  outset,  they  may  have  been  accepted  by  tra- 
dition as  a  matter  of  course,  they  may  have  been 
eagerly  embraced  in  a  moment  of  excitement;  or 
even  if  maturely  and  deliberately  accepted,  they 
may  never  have  gained  any  firm  hold  upon  the 
mind  or  become  the  real  basis  of  character.  And 
from  simple  neglect  they  are  swept  away,  one  by 
one,  in  the  rush  of  an  eventful  and  eager  life,  by 
other  interests  that  absorb  the  thought.  If  they 
are  nothing  more  than  mere  intellectual  convictions, 
this  will  be  true  of  them.  You  may  give  your 
thorough  adherence,  at  twenty  years  of  age,  to  the 
principles  of  a  political  party,  and  never  think  of 
them  again  until  you  are  forty,  and  what  is  your 
old  political  faith  worth  to  you  then  ?  If  your  re- 
ligion meant  to  you  certain  motives  of  conduct  and 
certain  currents  of  affection,  it  is  truer  still.  For  a 
motive  that  is  seldom  heeded  soon  ceases  to  be  a 
motive,  and  love  will  quickly  die  if  you  pay  no  at- 
tention to  it.  But  if  that  which  is  claimed  for  the 
Christian  religion  is  true,  if  it  is  something  more 
than  a  system  of  beliefs  and  a  condition  of  devout 


A  Lost  Faith  21 

and  trustful  feeling,  if  it  does  really  bring  the 
human  soul  into  communion  with  God,  so  that  He 
makes  His  nearness  felt,  His  truth  clear.  His  love 
a  sweet  and  sacred  possession  to  those  who  seek 
Him  through  Jesus  Christ, — if  that  is  what  is  meant 
by  a  Christian  faith,  then  you  surely  need  not  won- 
der that  it  has  lost  its  reality  if  you  have  lived  in 
disregard  of  it.  That  kind  of  religion,  if  it  is  pos- 
sible to  men,  is  possible  only  to  those  who  are  in- 
tent upon  it.  And  if  yours  was  not  that,  it  was 
not  a  religion  at  all,  and  you  might  as  well  let  it 
go.  You  never  have  known  what  a  religion  is.  It 
is  not  an  opinion  or  a  score  of  opinions ;  it  is  not 
an  emotion  or  a  series  of  emotions.  It  is  drawing 
near  and  keeping  near  to  God,  in  reverent  adora- 
tion, in  humble  contrition,  in  childlike  trust,  in 
holy  obedience,  in  free  and  peaceful  and  glad  com- 
munion. If  you  have  given  up  your  religion,  it  is 
possible  you  never  had  one,  or  if  you  have  once 
possessed  it,  you  may  have  simply  let  it  die.  It 
matters  little  to  you  or  to  any  one  else  whether  you 
believe  certain  things  or  not,  if  you  stop  with  be- 
lieving them ;  it  matters  very  much,  if  you  act  on 
your  convictions.  But  convictions  are  not  always 
wrought  by  arguments,  they  are  worn  into  the  mind 
by  experience  also.  And  religious  convictions, 
above  all  others,  are  the  fruit  of  experience  as  well 
as  of  inquiry.  If  your  faith  was  only  a  belief,  you 
may  have  lost  it  by  neglect.  If  it  was  the  begin- 
ning of  a  new  life,   it  may  have  been  smothered 


22'  Life  Indeed 

or  trampled  upon,  with  all  its  promise  of  an 
ever  unfolding  and  deepening  evidence  of  its 
own  divine  origin,  in  the  hot  pursuit  of  other 
things. 

Or  it  may  be  that  on  the  other  hand  the  very  in- 
tensity with  which  you  have  embraced  and  tried  to 
practice  some  of  the  principles  of  Christianity,  has 
ultimately  led  to  your  abandonment  of  them  all. 
You  took,  for  instance,  the  view  which  the  Bible 
gives  of  sin,  and  you  believed  it.  You  looked 
abroad  upon  society,  you  looked  within  upon  your 
own  heart,  and  you  found  it  confirmed.  You  read 
in  the  Scriptures  certain  startling  and  terrible 
words  concerning  the  destiny  of  those  who  live  and 
die  in  disregard  or  defiance  of  God,  and  you 
shuddered  as  you  read  them.  You  saw  over  against 
them  the  pattern  of  a  life  dazzling  in  its  purity,  divine 
in  its  disinterestedness,  you  knew  that  your  life 
ought  to  be  like  it,  and  your  intensest  efforts  could 
not  make  it  so.  You  have  struggled  and  watched 
and  waited  and  prayed,  but  it  has  all  been  in  vain. 
You  felt  the  universal  taint  within  you,  you  saw  the 
irreversible  doom  before  you,  and  in  the  revolt  of 
despair  you  have  flung  it  all  away.  It  is  perhaps 
too  late  to  ask  you  whether  your  views  of  the  Bible 
were  as  broad  as  they  were  deep;  if  you  really 
think  that  the  effect  of  the  life  of  Jesus  Christ 
ought  to  be  not  to  save  sinners  but  to  drive  sinners 
mad.  You  may  have  lost  your  faith  in  this  way, 
because  some  of  the  doctrines  which  you  held  were 


A  Lost  Faith  23 

so  sombre  that  the  very  Light  of  the  World  could 
not  tinge  them  with  hope. 

Or  again,  such  a  state  of  mind  may  seem  to  you 
mystical,  monkish,  mediaeval.  Your  faith  in  the 
gospel  has  gone  down  at  the  touch  of  the  spirit  of 
modern  inquiry.  It  cannot  be  that  if  you  have 
ever  known  it  and  valued  it,  if  you  have  any  real 
comprehension  of  what  it  is  and  what  it  has  done, 
you  should  let  it  go  merely  because  others  have 
done  so.  You  will  not,  if  you  are  a  thoughtful 
and  serious  person,  let  a  gust  of  fashion  which 
seems  to  be  blowing  across  society,  topple  over 
your  most  sacred  beliefs.  They  are  but  fragile 
things  if  that  can  happen.  You  will  not  let  them 
be  puffed  out  of  existence  by  the  mockery  of  a 
sprightly  and  flippant  essayist,  whose  easy  philoso- 
phy quietly  ignores  what  you  know  to  be  the 
broadest  facts  of  human  life  and  the  deepest  in- 
stincts of  the  human  soul.  That  is  not  modern 
thought.  St.  Paul  confronted  it  at  Athens.  Horace 
wove  it  into  graceful  alcaics  in  the  sensuous  idle- 
ness of  his  Sabine  farm.  No,  it  is  the  great  dis- 
coveries of  natural  science,  and  the  methods  of 
thought  which  it  encourages,  which  have  so  rudely 
shaken  your  ancient  faith.  But  here  also  you  have 
of  course  been  careful  to  distinguish  what  is  really 
established  from  what  is  only  conjectured.  If  you 
are  not  yourself  a  scientific  expert,  you  have  taken 
into  account  only  that  which  wise  and  cautious  men 
have  agreed  to  accept  as  proved.     And  since  the 


24  Life  Indeed 

phenomena  of  religion  cannot  be  measured  or 
weighed,  since  they  belong  to  a  sphere  beyond  the 
reach  of  telescope  or  microscope,  you  have  tested 
the  fitness  of  your  scientific  leaders  to  be  the  guides 
of  your  thought  in  these  invisible  realms.  You 
have  inquired  into  their  logical  methods.  You 
have  made  sure  that  they  are  as  careful  in  collect- 
ing and  as  impartial  in  comparing  the  facts  of 
human  as  of  physical  nature.  You  have  exacted 
of  them  clear  definitions.  If  they  speak  of  matter 
and  force,  you  have  found  out  precisely  what  they 
mean  by  matter  and  force.  You  have  found  it  es- 
tablished beyond  a  question  that  there  is  here  no 
jugglery  of  words,  that  the  ultimate  fact  of  the 
universe  is  really  something  else  than  the  God 
whom  you  ignorantly  worshipped.  Such  an  in- 
quiry has  led  you  along  perilous  heights  of  thought, 
but  you  have  fearlessly  scaled  them.  You  have 
shrunk  from  no  labor,  have  been  daunted  by  no 
obstacles  in  the  pursuit  of  truth.  You  surely  would 
not  give  up  a  faith  so  dear,  so  hallowed,  so  benefi- 
cent, because  any  teacher  tells  you  it  is  vain,  or  be- 
cause much  of  the  literature  of  your  time  makes 
haste  to  repeat,  with  every  variety  of  incomplete- 
ness and  distortion,  conclusions  which  sweep  it 
away.  You  have  yielded  your  ground  only  inch  by 
inch,  as  one  who  is  defending  his  most  sacred 
treasures.  And  you  have  surrendered  these  at  last, 
precious  still,  more  precious  than  ever  if  you  have 
found  no  other  beliefs  more  consoling  and  inspiring 


A  Lost  Faith  25 

to  take  their  place — you  have  surrendered  them  be- 
cause you  could  keep  them  no  longer.  And  from 
your  earnest,  distracted,  truth-loving  soul,  there 
rises  into  the  empty  heavens  the  bitter  cry,  '*They 
have  taken  away  my  Lord,  and  I  know  not  where 
they  have  laid  Him." 

If  now  in  one  of  these  ways  or  in  any  other,  you 
have  lost  your  faith  in  the  religion  of  Jesus  Christ, 
let  me  say  to  you  three  things. 

The  first  is  :  Be  sure  that  it  is  dead.  It  may  be 
only  sleeping.  It  may  rise  into  a  life  larger,  more 
beautiful,  more  fruitful  than  before.  It  may  be  that 
there  is  after  all  a  personal,  loving,  forgiving  God. 
It  may  be  that  He  has  a  care  for  the  soul  of  man, 
with  its  certain  possession  of  reason  and  its  pas- 
sionate longing  for  immortality.  Perhaps  He  even 
cares  for  you,  and  by  paths  that  you  do  not  know 
is  leading  you  to  a  better  knowledge  of  Himself 
and  to  a  nobler  and  truer  life.  Perhaps  He  will  let 
you  see  that  you  cannot  do  without  Him,  without 
the  light  of  His  revelation,  without  the  knowledge 
of  His  Son.  Do  not  make  haste  to  bury  your  re- 
ligion. Do  not  publish  abroad  your  resolution  to 
get  on  hereafter  without  it.  You  too  may  find 
yourself  standing  one  day  in  helpless  and  hopeless 
desolation,  among  the  chilling  shadows  of  life,  and 
One  whom  you  in  your  blindness  supposed  to  be 
only  a  man  like  yourself  will  utter  your  name,  and 
you  will  fall  at  His  feet,  like  the  Magdalen  in  the 
Garden,  with  a  great  cry  of  joy. 


26  Life  Indeed 

But  if  this  is  not  so  and  your  faith  is  never  again 
to  come  to  life,  then  you  will  do  well  to  mourn  for 
it.  Do  not  exult  in  your  disbelief  as  an  escape 
from  superstition.  It  is  the  greatest  calamity  that 
has  ever  befallen  you.  It  is  not  an  emancipation, 
it  is  a  bereavement.  The  soul  or  the  century  that 
has  parted  with  its  religious  faith,  ought  to  be  pro- 
foundly sad. 

Upon  the  white  sea  sand 

There  sat  a  pilgrim  band 
Telling  the  losses  that  their  lives  had  known, 

While  evening  waned  away 

From  breezy  cliff  and  bay, 
And  the  strong  tide  went  out  with  weary  moan. 

One  spake  with  quivering  lip 

Of  a  fair-freighted  ship 
With  all  his  household  to  the  deep  gone  down ; 

And  one  had  wilder  woe 

For  a  fair  face  long  ago 
Lost  in  the  darker  depths  of  a  great  town. 

There  were  who  mourned  their  youth 

With  a  most  loving  truth, 
For  its  brave  hopes  and  memories  ever  green ; 

And  one  upon  the  west 

Turned  an  eye  that  would  not  rest. 
For  far-off  hills  whereon  his  joys  had  been. 

Some  spake  of  vanished  gold, 

Some  of  proud  honors  told, 
And  some  of  friends  that  were  their  trust  no  more; 

And  one  of  a  green  grave 

Beside  a  foreign  wave, 
That  made  him  sit  so  lonely  on  the  shore. 


A  Lost  Faith  ^7 

But  when  their  tales  were  done, 

There  spake  among  them  one, 
A  stranger,  seeming  from  all  sorrow  free : 

"  Sad  losses  have  ye  met, 

But  mine  is  heavier  yet, 
For  a  believing  heart  is  gone  from  me." 

*'  Alas !  "  these  pilgrims  said, 

"  For  the  living  and  the  dead. 
For  fortune's  cruelty,  for  love's  sure  cross, 

For  the  wrecks  of  land  and  sea. 

But  howe'er  it  came  to  thee, 
Thine,  stranger,  is  life's  last  and  heaviest  loss." 

Finally,  if  you  have  lost  the  faith  that  you  once 
had,  get  another.  Not  to  make  you  a  decent  and 
orderly  citizen.  Your  natural  disposition,  your 
early  education,  the  forces  of  a  society  which  is  as 
full  of  the  influences  of  the  religion  you  have  dis- 
carded, as  the  noonday  air  is  full  of  light,  may 
still  keep  you  honest  and  gentle  and  pure.  Not  to 
give  you  tranquillity  of  mind  ;  you  may  go  through 
life  cheerfully  and  meet  death  calmly  believing 
nothing.  You  can  stiffen  your  fortitude  to  meet 
the  inevitable,  you  can  train  your  courage  to  face 
the  unknown.  But  to  be  a  man  whose  nature  is 
moulded  by  the  finest  influences,  whose  soul  is  in- 
spired by  the  grandest  ideals,  whose  life  is  exalted 
to  the  highest  levels,  you  must  have  some  religious 
faith.  Do  not  take  Christianity  if  you  cannot  be- 
lieve in  it,  but  be  sure  that  the  faith  which  you 
adopt  is  a  better  one  than  the  religion  of  Christ ', 


28  Life  Indeed 

not  freer  from  mysteries,  not  easier  in  its  obliga- 
tions,— these  things  are  not  merits  in  a  rehgion ; 
but  more  sublime  in  its  doctrines,  more  convincing 
in  its  evidences,  more  inspiring  in  its  motives,  more 
mighty  in  its  power  to  transform  and  to  elevate 
character.  Let  it  be  a  religion  which  not  only 
makes  you  a  broader  and  better  man,  but  which 
will  do  for  the  world,  in  the  future,  more  than 
Christianity  has  done,  and  is  doing.  And  if  you 
look  in  vain  for  such  a  religion,  then  come  back 
and  consider  whether  there  is  not  a  divine  meaning 
in  a  certain  Roman  cross  and  a  certain  empty 
tomb. 


DE  PROFUNDIS 


Out  of  the  depths  have  I  cried  unto  Thee,  O 
Lord. — Psalm  cxxx.  i. 


II 

DE  PROFUNDIS 

The  depths  of  which  the  Psalmist  speaks  were 
those  of  penitence.  We  do  not  know  his  name,  or 
the  nature  of  his  sin,  or  what  led  him  to  repent  of 
it,  or  what  caused  him  to  believe  that  God  would 
forgive  it.  But  it  evidently  occasioned  him  great 
distress,  and  out  of  this  he  cried  to  God  for  mercy. 
His  prayer  was  answered,  and  he  obtained  the  for- 
giveness which  he  sought. 

It  shows  that  sin  is  not  a  modern  thing.  It 
shows  that  repentance  is  not  a  purely  Christian  sen- 
timent. The  sense  of  guilt  is  as  ancient  and  as 
universal  as  the  human  race.  And  whenever  and 
wherever  it  has  been  profoundly  felt,  men  have 
cried  to  God  for  pity  and  for  pardon.  We  observe 
this  in  connection  with  every  form  of  religious  be- 
lief, and  we  observe  it  in  the  case  of  those  who 
have  had  litde  thought  or  care  in  regard  to  religion. 
Whenever  the  conscience  is  profoundly  stirred,  men 
instinctively  cry  out  to  God. 

The  same  is  true  of  one  who  finds  himself  plunged 
into  great  depths  of  sorrow.  When  life  is  bright 
and  the  heart  is  glad,  we  are  very  often  unmindful 
of  the  fact  that  all  our  happiness  comes  from  Him, 
and  that  we  owe  to  Him  at  least  the  tribute  of  grati- 
31 


32  Life  Indeed 

tude.  It  is  not  impossible  for  us  even  to  go  on  for 
many  days  or  years,  with  no  distinct  acknowledg- 
ment of  His  goodness,  and  no  recognition  of  our 
obligations  to  Him.  But  when  some  overwhelming 
grief  befalls  us,  we  remember  Him.  We  ought  to 
think  of  Him  as  the  author  of  our  joy.  We  almost 
always  think  of  Him  as  the  author  of  our  sorrow. 
And  if  we  have  never  before  asked  anything  of 
Him,  we  are  then  very  apt  to  ask  His  help.  Some- 
times it  is  light  that  we  want,  and  we  demand  of 
Him  that  He  shall  tell  us  why  He  has  thus  afflicted 
us.  Oftener  still  it  is  comfort  and  strength.  Our 
burden  seems  heavier  than  we  can  bear.  The 
nearest  of  our  friends  cannot  help  us  to  bear  it. 
And  out  of  the  depths  of  our  distress  we  cry  to 
God.  At  such  a  time  we  seem  to  be  face  to  face 
with  Him.  Things  that  have  long  amused  us  or 
absorbed  us  fade  away.  And  we  send  up  our 
prayer  for  comfort  to  Him  who  alone  can  enable  us 
to  bear  the  trial  He  has  sent  upon  us. 

The  same  is  true  again  of  almost  any  one  who 
finds  himself  in  sudden  and  imminent  peril.  You 
remember  the  vivid  picture  in  the  one  hundred  and 
seventh  Psalm  of  those  who  go  down  to  the  sea  in 
ships,  and  do  business  in  great  waters,  and  who  are 
thus  exposed  to  the  danger  of  shipwreck.  "  Then 
they  cry,"  it  says,  *'unto  the  Lord  in  their  trouble, 
and  He  bringeth  them  out  of  their  distresses."  It 
happens  far  oftener  now  than  then.  A  careless 
company  of  people  may  somewhere  at  this  moment 


De   Profundis  33 

be  lounging  and  chatting  on  a  ship's  deck.  There 
is  an  outbreak  of  fire,  or  the  crash  of  a  colHsion. 
Everything  is  excitement  and  confusion.  And 
those  who  never  prayed  before  cry  out  to  God  to 
have  pity  upon  them  and  save  them.  So  whenever 
an  unexpected  casualty  happens,  and  men  find 
themselves  confronting  death,  or  when  in  sickness 
the  resources  of  human  skill  prove  unavailing,  and 
the  tenderest  human  love  is  helpless,  in  the  dire 
emergency  and  the  desperate  danger  the  soul  in- 
stinctively cries  out  to  God.  The  danger  may  pass 
and  the  old  mood  of  religious  indifference  return, 
but  one  never  forgets  such  an  experience ;  no  one 
ought  to  forget  the  lesson  which  it  teaches. 

So  it  is  again  very  often,  when  one  finds  himself 
facing  a  difficult  duty.  In  the  ordinary  concerns 
of  life  we  may  not  feel  any  particular  need  of  di- 
vine guidance  or  help.  It  is  not  easy  to  keep  this 
constantly  in  mind  amidst  the  innumerable  things 
that  we  are  doing  every  day.  But  when  an  un- 
usual responsibility  is  laid  upon  us,  and  we  are 
compelled  to  undertake  some  task  of  critical  im- 
portance, we  not  only  recognize,  but  we  do  not 
hesitate  to  confess  it.  It  is  not  merely  a  concession 
to  the  religious  prejudices  of  the  people,  or  a  com- 
pliance with  long-established  usage  when  a  newly- 
elected  president  of  the  United  States,  on  entering 
upon  his  office,  publicly  expresses  the  sense  of  de- 
pendence upon  God.  On  the  eve  of  a  great  battle, 
many  a  stout  soldier  has  been  heard  to  pray.     Be- 


34  Life  Indeed 

fore  attempting  a  difficult  operation,  many  a  devout 
physician  has  been  known  to  ask  God's  help.  At 
such  times  we  feel  that  we  may  properly  do  this. 
Out  of  the  depths  of  our  need,  we  naturally  cry  to 
God. 

We  all  do  the  same  thing  when  we  find  ourselves 
in  the  depths  of  discouragement  and  of  despond- 
ency. When  we  are  disappointed  at  the  ill  success 
of  efforts  we  have  made ;  when  we  are  baffled  by 
difficulties  that  we  could  not  foresee  and  cannot 
surmount ;  when  we  are  uncertain  as  to  what  we 
ought  to  do ;  when  we  are  in  doubt  as  to  those  on 
whom  we  can  depend ;  in  a  word,  when  our  judg- 
ment wavers  and  our  courage  fails,  we  are  very  apt, 
are  we  not,  to  look  upward  and  ask  counsel  and 
aid — the  counsel  and  aid  of  God.  Conscious  of 
our  weakness,  we  cry  to  Him  for  strength ;  hope- 
less of  success  without  His  help,  we  pray  that  He 
will  guide  and  help  us. 

And  then  once  more,  not  to  multiply  these  illus- 
trations, we  are  all  apt  to  cry  to  God  out  of  the 
depths  of  some  unwonted  joy.  We  take,  as  I  have 
said,  the  ordinary  blessings  of  life  with  little  thank- 
fulness, with  little  serious  recognition  even,  of  the 
source  from  which  they  come.  But  now  and  then 
there  comes  to  us  a  happiness  so  great,  so  un- 
expected, so  overwhelming,  that  our  hearts  are 
lifted  by  it  above  their  ordinary  level,  as  a  ship  is 
lifted  by  a  rushing  wave.  The  ordinary  language 
of  life  is  then  insufficient  to  express  our  deep  emo- 


De    Profundis  35 

tion.  It  is  not  enough  for  us  to  gather  in  the  con- 
gratulations of  our  friends,  or  to  manifest  our  new- 
found happiness  by  any  look  or  gesture  of  delight. 
*' Thank  God,"  we  say,  "Thank  God!"  The 
words  may  sound  strangely  on  our  lips.  But  they 
are  forced  from  the  depths  of  our  rejoicing  hearts 
by  that  intensity  of  feeling  which  finds  no  other 
adequate  expression. 

So  it  is  then  very  often  with  men  of  different  na- 
tures, different  training,  different  opinions  and 
beliefs.  When  life  moves  calmly  on  upon  its  ordi- 
nary level,  they  seldom  think,  perhaps,  of  God, 
they  care  little  about  Him.  He  is  not  in  all  their 
thoughts,  and  perhaps  not  in  any  of  them.  They 
are  not  conscious  of  their  dependence  upon  Him, 
they  ,do  not  recognize  their  obligations  to  Him. 
But  as  soon  as  they  find  themselves  in  some  one  of 
the  graver  and  more  critical  experiences  of  life, 
when  the  depths  of  their  souls  are  stirred,  and  the 
voice  of  human  nature  makes  itself  heard,  you 
find  them  crying  out  to  God.  It  may  be  in  faith 
and  hope.  It  may  be  in  terror  and  despair.  But 
His  is  the  name  which  then  leaps  to  their  lips. 
Out  of  the  depths  of  their  souls  there  goes  up  to 
Him  an  instinctive  though  perhaps  involuntary 
prayer. 

Now  there  is,  I  think,  something  extremely  sug- 
gestive in  this.  It  may  not  prove  anything,  but  it 
certainly  seems  to  indicate  that  there  is  a  natural 
affinity  between  our  souls  and  God.     For  these  are 


36  Life  Indeed 

occasions  when  our  true  nature  speaks  and  acts. 
The  restraints  of  conventionaUty  and  of  habit  are 
laid  aside.  The  influences  of  training  and  of  envi- 
ronment no  longer  control  us.  There  is  no  fear  of 
men  before  our  eyes.  But  we  feel  that  we  must 
reach,  and  reach  at  once,  the  highest  source  of  aid 
and  comfort  which  we  can  possibly  attain.  We 
are  face  to  face  with  supreme  realities.  And  what 
do  we  do  ?  We  cry  out  for  God.  It  is  as  if  we 
knew  that  our  souls  can  find  their  true  satisfaction, 
that  our  nature  finds  its  real  completeness,  that  our 
wants  attain  their  full  supply,  in  Him  alone.  It  is 
as  if  we  realized  that  we  are  made  for  Him  as  well 
as  by  Him,  that  there  is  an  indestructible  bond  of 
kinship  between  us.  So  a  mother  and  child,  after 
long  separation,  rush  into  one  another's  embrace, 
heedless  of  the  throng  of  unknown  or  indifferent 
strangers  who  may  be  standing  by.  So  the  elec- 
tricity that  is  in  the  cloud  recognizes  its  affinity 
with  that  which  is  in  the  earth,  and  leaps  to  unite 
with  it,  forcing  its  way  through  whatever  obstacles 
may  intervene.  If  there  were  not  such  an  inde- 
structible bond  between  us  and  the  infinite  and 
eternal  One  above  us,  we  certainly  should  not  so 
promptly,  invariably,  passionately,  cry  out  for  Him 
from  the  deepest  experiences  of  life  and  in  those 
moments  when  the  deepest  impulses  of  our  nature 
are  aroused.  Augustine's  familiar  words  are  true, 
'*Thou,  O  God,  hast  made  us,  and  made  us  for 
Thyself;  and  our  hearts  are  restless  until  they  rest 


De   Profundis  37 

in  Thee."  While  we  are  floating  calmly  on  the 
bright  current  of  our  ordinary  life,  we  easily  forget 
this.  We  feel  no  need  of  rest.  But  when  the 
waves  and  billows  of  some  tempestuous  experience 
threaten  to  overwhelm  us,  it  becomes  to  us  a  reality 
in  comparision  with  which  everything  else  appears 
unreal.  The  depths  are  then  uncovered,  and  the 
fact  is  revealed  to  us  that  we  are  akin  to  the  Infin- 
ite, that  we  bear  the  image  of  our  Maker,  that  we 
are  the  children  of  God. 

Then  again  this  habit  which  we  so  often  observe 
shows  how  profound  and  how  ineradicable  is  the 
faith  of  man  in  God.  There  is  in  the  world  not  a 
little  formal  atheism ;  there  is  much  more  practical 
atheism.  Men  lose  themselves  in  speculation  and 
conjecture  as  to  everything  that  lies  outside  the 
sphere  of  the  senses.  Unable  to  demonstrate  that 
which  can  be  subjected  to  no  sensible  tests  nor 
brought  within  the  range  of  an  inexorable  logic, 
they  persuade  themselves  that  there  is  nothing 
there,  or  that  at  least  they  can  know  nothing 
about  it.  As  to  the  old  doctrine  of  a  personal  God, 
who  is  in  living  relations  with  His  creatures,  on 
whose  care  and  bounty  they  depend,  whose  moral 
law  it  is  their  duty  to  obey,  they  declare  that  they 
do  not  believe  in  it,  that  no  really  intelligent  man 
can  any  longer  believe  in  it.  And  yet  all  the  time 
there  is  in  the  depths  of  their  souls  an  underlying 
and  inextinguishable  faith  in  such  a  God.  It  is 
not  a  matter  of  tradition  or  of  early  training.     It  is 


38  Life  Indeed 

not  a  conclusion  to  which  they  have  been  led  by 
processes  of  philosophic  thought.  It  is  one  of  the 
elementary  principles,  one  of  the  primary  convic- 
tions of  the  human  mind.  Look  over  the  world, 
study  its  various  races,  examine  its  different  reli- 
gions, you  will  find  everywhere  the  belief  in  God. 
Take  the  men  of  highest  culture  and  widest  knowl- 
edge, in  this  or  any  other  Christian  land,  those 
who  say  that  they  do  not  believe  in  Him,  or  who 
act  as  if  they  did  not,  and  let  some  critical  experi- 
ence uncover  the  foundations  of  their  thought  and 
feeling,  and  you  will  find,  far  down  below  all  the 
doubts  and  questionings  that  may  appear  upon  the 
surface,  a  faith  in  Him  and  a  reverence  for  Him 
which  have  not  been  and  which  can  never  be  de- 
stroyed. 

Then  again  the  fact  of  which  I  am  speaking 
shows  why  it  is  that  men  so  often  do  not  look  to 
God  in  the  spirit  of  obedience  and  the  spirit  of 
confidence, — why  they  are  so  often  indifferent  or 
skeptical  about  Him.  It  is  because  they  are  mov- 
ing on  the  surface  of  life.  The  inmost  depths  of 
their  nature  have  never  been  disturbed.  It  is  in 
some  respects  fortunate  that  this  has  been  the  case. 
One  cannot  bear  to  pass  very  often  through  these 
critical  experiences  to  which  I  have  referred.  They 
are  as  exhausting  as  they  are  illuminating.  But  so 
long  as  one  sails  calmly  and  prosperously  over 
summer  seas,  he  has  little  conception  of  the  great 
depths  beneath  him  or  of  what  the   fury  of  the 


De   Profundis  39 

storm  can  do.  And  there  are  few  of  us  who  really 
know  what  is  in  the  depths  of  our  own  souls.  We 
are  cheered  and  charmed  by  the  brightness  and 
beauty  of  the  world  around  us.  We  do  not  sus- 
pect the  energy  or  the  significance  of  the  tremen- 
dous forces  within  us.  And  so  it  is  that  in  their 
easy-going  and  comfortable  lives  men  often  fancy 
that  they  can  get  along  as  well  without  God  as  with 
Him.  They  feel  no  need  of  His  guidance,  His  help, 
His  comfort.  Why  should  any  one  fancy  that  he 
needs  these  or  that  it  is  possible  to  have  them? 
And  the  skepticism  or  indifference  of  those  who 
speak  and  act  in  this  way  affects  multitudes  of 
others.  Ah,  but  if  you  are  going  to  take  the  testi- 
mony of  anybody  in  this  matter,  take  that  of  some 
one  who  knows  what  life  really  is,  some  one  who 
has  really  lived,  some  one  who  has  gone  down  into 
the  depths  of  sorrow  or  fear  or  penitence.  Do  not 
be  satisfied  with  the  superficial  views  of  life  which 
are  very  naturally  the  common  views  of  it.  But 
let  the  nobler,  more  serious,  and  deeper  thinkers 
of  the  world  tell  you  what  they  have  found  out  in 
regard  to  human  nature,  its  capacities,  its  needs, 
its  aspirations,  and  its  moral  helplessness.  Search 
the  Scriptures,  or  if  you  will  not  do  that,  study  the 
poets  from  Sophocles  to  Dante,  from  Shakspeare  to 
Browning.  You  will  learn  from  them  that  life  is 
no  holiday  matter,  that  the  human  soul  has  both 
powers  and  wants  of  which  you,  perhaps,  have 
never  dreamed.     Before  you  make  up  your  mind 


40  Life  Indeed 

either  that  there  is  no  living  God  whom  you  can 
cry  to,  or  that  there  is  no  use  in  appeaUng  to  Him 
in  your  need,  consider  the  witness  that  has  been 
borne  to  Him  by  those  who  have  not  been  content 
or  been  able  to  drift  lazily  upon  the  surface,  but 
have  sounded  the  awful  depths  of  life. 

And  so  the  reason  is  apparent  why  God  often 
sends  us  down  into  these  depths.  It  is  not  that  He 
has  forgotten  us  or  wishes  to  destroy  us.  It  is  only 
that  we  may  find  Him  there.  He  knows  very  well 
that  otherwise  we  may  fail  to  discover  Him.  He 
knows  how  easily  we  are  dazzled  and  misled  by  the 
lights  that  sparkle  and  dance  around  us ;  He  knows 
how  easy  it  is  for  us  to  be  content  with  what  the 
passing  hour  may  bring.  He  knows  that  when  our 
immediate  desires  are  gratified,  we  are  only  too  apt 
to  forget  that  we  have  any  deeper  desires.  And  so 
He  sends  disappointment  upon  us,  or  perplexity, 
or  sorrow  and  affliction.  He  lets  all  His  waves 
and  billows  go  over  us.  He  suffers  us  to  struggle 
vainly  and  in  the  darkness,  until  our  strength  is 
exhausted  and  our  hope  itself  extinct.  There  was, 
perhaps,  no  other  way  by  which  we  could  be  taught 
our  ignorance,  our  weakness  and  our  need  of  His 
almighty  and  ever-present  help.  Out  of  the  depths 
we  were  forced  to  cry  to  Him,  and  our  cry  has 
brought  Him  to  the  rescue.  We  sometimes  pity 
those  who  are  called  to  pass  through  such  an  ex- 
perience. We  are  tempted  to  ask,  like  the  Phari- 
sees of  old,    <*Who  did  sin,  this  man  or  his  par- 


De   Profundis  41 

ents,"  that  such  a  calamity  should  overtake  him? 
And  yet  they  are  richer  than  we  in  the  knowledge 
of  life,  and  richer  far  in  that  knowledge  of  God 
which  comes  by  a  deep  experience  of  life.  He 
who  cries  to  Him  out  of  the  depths,  learns  in  this 
way  to  say,  '*I  wait  for  the  Lord;  my  soul  doth 
wait,  and  in  His  word  do  I  hope.  My  soul  waiteth 
for  the  Lord  more  than  they  that  watch  for  the 
morning ;  I  say,  more  than  they  that  watch  for  the 
morning.  For  with  the  Lord  there  is  mercy,  and 
with  Him  is  plenteous  redemption."  It  is  not  a 
costly  experience  which  teaches  us  that  lesson.  It 
is  one  from  which  we  need  not  shrink.  It  is  one 
for  which  we  shall  be  forever  grateful. 

And  here  is  the  ground  of  our  belief  in  the 
permanence  of  religion  in  the  world.  We  some- 
times feel,  no  doubt,  as  if  the  ages  of  faith  had 
passed,  or  were,  at  all  events,  swiftly  passing  away ; 
as  if  religion  were  losing  its  hold  on  men ;  as  if 
after  one  or  two  generations  more  have  come  and 
gone,  it  will  forever  have  disappeared.  There  is 
so  much  unbelief  around  us.  And  what  is  worse 
than  unbelief,  there  is  so  much  indifference  to  all 
spiritual  things,  to  all  moral  obligations.  Is  not 
religion  something  which  is  peculiar  to  the  earlier 
stages  of  human  development,  and  which  men  will 
soon  be  able  to  dispense  with  ?  No,  because  human 
nature  is  really  the  same  to-day  that  it  has  always 
been.  Life  is  more  complex,  more  showy,  more 
exciting.     The   things   that   are   seen    have   more 


42  Life  Indeed 

power  than  they  once  had  to  shut  out  of  human 
view  the  things  that  are  not  seen.  And  Hfe  is  not 
only  more  varied  and  intense,  it  is  vastly  more 
fascinating  and  more  joyous  for  most  people  than  it 
used  to  be.  But  great  crises  of  thought  and  feel- 
ing still  come.  They  come  as  often  as  ever. 
Sooner  or  later  they  come  to  all  of  us.  The  great 
capacities  and  needs  of  which  men  were  conscious 
in  the  days  of  Abraham  and  of  David,  are  just  as 
really  in  us.  Now  as  then,  we  are  called  from 
time  to  time  to  go  down  into  the  depths,  where  no 
human  hand  or  voice  can  reach  us,  and  where  we 
are  utterly  alone  and  utterly  forlorn,  unless  we  cry 
to  God  and  He  hears  and  answers  us.  It  is  only 
the  surface  of  life  which  is  changing.  The  depths 
of  life  remain  from  century  to  century  the  same. 
And  therefore  religion,  which  appeals  to  that  which 
is  deepest  in  human  nature  and  in  human  experi- 
ence, is  not  going  to  lose  its  power  over  the  mind 
or  heart  or  conscience  of  mankind.  And  those  of 
us  who  are  interested  in  extending  its  influence, — 
what  we  want  is  simply  to  get  below  the  surface 
of  men's  lives,  and  touch  if  we  can  their  deeper 
nature.  We  need  to  rouse  their  consciences.  We 
need  to  stir  their  hearts.  We  need  to  get  behind 
the  web  of  sophistry  in  which  they  so  often  wrap 
themselves  up,  to  that  which  is  most  radical,  vital, 
and  essential  in  their  thought.  We  shall  fail  very 
often,  no  doubt,  and  be  discouraged.  But  in  its 
appeal   to  the   deepest  convictions  and  the  most 


De   Profundis  43 

secret  desires  of  human  nature,  has  always  lain  the 
power  of  religious  truth.  And  God  still  speaks  to 
men's  souls  and  in  them,  with  an  authority  and  a 
power  which  they  recognize  when  the  accidents  of 
life  are  torn  away,  and  they  face  its  eternal  and  un- 
changing realities.  Nothing  less  than  God  can 
ever  fully  satisfy  the  human  heart.  And  the  time 
will  never  come  when  men  will  cease  to  cry  to  Him 
out  of  the  depths. 

And  yet  it  is  not  only  in  our  times  of  distress 
that  we  need  Him ;  and  He  who  alone  is  able  to 
deliver  us  in  the  hour  of  trouble,  is  our  ever-present 
Friend  and  Guide  and  Helper.  We  need  Him  in 
our  bright  days  as  well  as  in  our  dark  days, — when 
all  goes  well  with  us,  as  truly  as  when  the  depths 
are  uncovered  and  the  foundations  of  the  earth  are 
seen.  We  owe  to  Him  our  gratitude,  our  rever- 
ence, our  obedience,  and  our  love,  when  He  leads 
us  in  the  green  pastures  and  beside  the  still  waters, 
just  as  much  as  when  we  are  toiling,  bewildered 
and  almost  exhausted,  across  the  desert  places  of 
life.  And  we  shall  know  how  to  seek  His  help  in 
time  of  need,  we  shall  rely  upon  it  with  a  tranquil 
confidence,  if  we  have  come  to  know  Him  and  trust 
Him  in  other  and  happier  days.  Is  it  not  a  sad 
and  humiliating  fact  that  there  are  so  many  of  God's 
children  who  never  think  of  Him  or  care  anything 
about  Him,  except  when  they  are  forced  to  cry  to 
Him  out  of  the  depths  ?  Happy  is  he  who  lives  in 
daily  converse  and  communion  with  God ;  who  in 


44  Life  Indeed 

joy  and  in  sorrow  alike,  in  sunshine  and  storm,  in 
life  and  death,  waits  patiently,  submissively,  cheer- 
fully, on  Him  !  He  shall  know  the  present  com- 
fort and  in  time  of  need  shall  receive  the  blessed 
fulfillment  of  the  promise,  *'When  thou  passest 
through  the  waters  I  will  be  with  thee,  and  through 
the  rivers,  they  shall  not  overflow  thee ;  when  thou 
walkest  through  the  fire,  thou  shalt  not  be  burned, 
neither  shall  the  flame  kindle  upon  thee ;  for  I  am 
the  Lord  thy  God,  the  Holy  One  of  Israel,  thy 
Saviour." 


GOD  WRESTLING  WITH  MAN 


And  Jacob  was  left  alone  ;  and  there  wrestled  a 
man  with  him  until  the  breaking  of  the  day. — Gen. 
xxxii.  24. 


Ill 

GOD  WRESTLING  WITH  MAN 

It  is  no  unusual  thing  to  see  a  man  wrestling 
with  himself.  There  are  at  least  two  natures  in 
each  of  us — the  higher  and  the  lower,  the  flesh  and 
the  spirit — and  these  two  often  come  into  sharp 
collision  with  each  other.  A  man  sometimes  dis- 
covers that  his  worst  enemy  is  not  outside  of  but 
within  him.  It  is  his  baser  self,  which  is  holding 
him  back  from  the  good  thing  that  his  soul  longs 
for,  which  is  keeping  him  down  on  a  low  and  un- 
worthy plane  of  life.  And  he  determines  that  he 
will  not  be  thus  thwarted  and  baffled.  He  locks 
arms,  as  it  were,  with  the  mean,  selfish,  evil  spirit 
that  has  such  a  hold  upon  him,  and  by  a  tremen- 
dous and  often  long-protracted  struggle  he  endeavors 
to  subdue  it.  It  is  a  splendid  sight  when  it  is 
bravely  undertaken  and  triumphantly  carried 
through.  It  is  one  of  the  saddest  of  sights  when 
the  evil  nature  proves  too  strong  to  be  overcome, 
and  when  the  soul's  efforts  to  win  its  freedom  end 
in  a  more  complete  and  hopeless  bondage. 

Every  man  whose  life  amounts  to  much  has  also 
to  wrestle  with  the  world.  But  it  is  not  at  all  sad- 
dening to  see  one  struggling  against  what  we  often 
call  adverse  circumstances,  if  his  principles  are 
47 


48  Life  Indeed 

sound  and  his  heart  is  pure  and  true.  The  contest 
will  develop  in  him  a  stronger  and  manlier  char- 
acter. The  truest  strength,  the  most  genuine 
manliness  can  be  developed  in  no  other  way.  It 
requires  a  tough  tussle  with  the  world  to  harden  a 
man's  moral  muscles,  to  teach  him  that  he  can  be 
independent  of  the  world  and  live  his  own  life  in 
freedom  and  peace,  to  show  him  how  quickly  and 
completely  the  world  acknowledges  the  mastery  of 
one  who  has  the  courage  to  face  it  boldly  and  re- 
fuse to  submit  to  its  dictation.  And  if  one  is  to  live 
the  higher  life  of  the  spirit,  it  can  only  be  in  spite, 
not  merely  of  the  fashions  and  conventions  and 
maxims  of  the  world,  but  of  the  motives  that  gov- 
ern it  and  the  ends  that  it  pursues. 

Sometimes  the  enemy  that  meets  one  on  his  way 
is  more  formidable,  because  more  mysterious  and 
impalpable.  It  seems  as  if  some  mighty  and 
malignant  spirit  were  wrestling  with  him  and  de- 
termined to  subdue  him.  Like  Jacob  he  does  not 
perhaps  know  its  name.  It  has  many  names.  But 
it  lurks  near  every  man's  path,  springs  upon  him  in 
unguarded  moments,  and  even  when  successfully 
resisted  and  driven  off,  returns  again  and  again  to 
the  attack.  There  are  not  many  of  us  who  have 
not  at  one  time  or  another  encountered  that  invis- 
ible adversary,  and  our  conflict  with  him  has  prob- 
ably left  us  sorely  wounded,  even  though  we  may 
have  finally  succeeded  in  putting  him  to  flight. 

It  is  no  rare  thing,  I  say,  to  see  men  wrestling 


God  Wrestling  with  Man         49 

with  the  world,  the  flesh,  and  the  devil.  But  who 
ever  heard  of  a  man  wrestling  with  God?  What 
an  unequal  strife  !  Who  could  hope  to  be  success- 
ful in  it  ?  And  what  motive  would  lead  any  man 
to  attempt  it  ?  Can  it  be  the  desire  to  extort  a  re- 
luctant blessing  from  Him?  But  would  not  a 
blessing  won  by  violence  be  in  reality  a  curse? 
And  is  not  God  always  ready  to  grant  His  blessing 
to  every  one  who  is  prepared  to  receive  it  ?  Out  of 
the  mysterious  story  of  Jacob's  conflict  with  one 
whom  he  did  not  know,  a  very  strange — I  will  say  a 
very  horrible — conclusion  has  been  drawn.  It  has 
led  us  to  speak  of  wrestling  with  God.  It  has 
made  us  think  of  Him  as  our  enemy,  or  at  least  our 
antagonist.  It  has  been  understood  as  teaching  that 
if  we  want  His  blessing,  we  must  in  some  way 
wring  it  from  Him.  And  so  we  still  sometimes 
hear  of  agonizing  in  prayer.  And  the  old  idea  of  a 
strenuous  contest  still  underlies  the  word.  The 
fact  of  God's  fatherly  love  is  forgotten.  The  fact 
of  His  infinite  grace  is  ignored.  The  great  truth, 
of  which  both  the  Old  and  the  New  Testaments  are 
full,  that  He  is  ''good,  and  ready  to  forgive,  and 
rich  in  mercy  to  all  who  call  upon  Him,"  is  for  the 
moment  quite  lost  sight  of.  And  there  rises  before 
us  the  image  of  One  with  whom  His  children  must 
wrestle  in  the  darkness,  and  whose  blessing,  in- 
stead of  being  the  free  gift  of  His  love,  must  be 
won  through  an  agony  of  soul. 

Now  I  venture  to  say  that  whatever  may  be  the 


50  Life  Indeed 

meaning  of  Jacob's  vision  at  Jabbok  Ford,  it  cannot 
mean  this.  And  I  think  that  if  you  will  study  it 
with  me  for  a  few  moments,  you  will  see  that  it 
does  not  mean  this.  It  was  not  he  who  wrestled 
there  with  God.  It  was  God  who  wrestled  with 
him.     And  this  is  a  very  different  thing. 

He  had  reached  a  crisis  in  his  life.  His  char- 
acter in  his  early  years  had  been  anything  but 
noble.  By  treachery  and  falsehood  he  had  deceived 
his  father  and  stolen  his  brother's  birthright.  This 
had  been  followed  by  an  exile  of  twenty — perhaps 
forty — years,  in  which  he  had  been  practically  a 
bond -servant  in  a  far  country.  He  was  now  re- 
turning to  the  land  of  his  birth — the  land  which 
had  been  promised  him  as  his  inheritance.  But 
his  fate  depended  on  the  hostile  or  friendly  disposi- 
tion of  his  brother,  whom  he  had  so  deeply 
wronged  and  who  had  now  become  a  powerful 
chieftain.  The  next  day  would  decide  his  destiny. 
He  sent  his  family  over  the  mountain  stream,  and 
remained  behind  alone. 

''And  there  wrestled  a  man  with  him  until  the 
breaking  of  the  day."  A  man?  So  he  thought 
at  first.  But  as  the  night  wore  on  he  realized  that 
it  was  not  a  man.  The  touch  that  threw  his  thigh- 
bone out  of  its  socket  was  not  that  of  a  human  finger. 
And  when  he  declared,  ''  I  will  not  let  Thee  go  ex- 
cept Thou  bless  me,"  it  was  no  man's  blessing  that 
he  sought.  He  knew  that  it  was  God  who  was 
contending  with  him.     If  he  seemed  to  prevail,  it 


God  Wrestling  with  Man  51 

was  only  because  his  antagonist  did  not  put  forth 
all  His  power.  He  could  not  make  Him  tell  His 
name.  But  he  himself  received  a  new  name  from 
Him,  and  the  blessing  that  he  asked  for  was  given 
him. 

Is  not  the  meaning  of  the  story  plain?  He 
stood,  as  I  have  said,  at  a  crisis  in  his  life, — years 
of  penitential  and  reformatory  discipline  behind 
him  and  a  great  destiny  before  him.  He  was  to 
inherit  the  land  of  promise.  He  was  to  be  the  an- 
cestor of  the  chosen  people  who  were  ever  afterward 
to  bear  his  name.  In  the  line  of  his  posterity  Jesus 
the  Christ  was  to  be  born.  For  such  an  eminent 
position  he  was  not  yet  wholly  prepared.  He 
needed  to  feel,  as  he  had  not  yet  felt  it,  the  power  of 
God.  He  needed  to  be  made  to  yield,  as  he  had 
never  yet  done,  to  the  will  of  God.  Before  God 
could  use  him,  as  He  meant  to  use  him,  He  must 
conquer  him.  And  He  did  conquer  him  in  that 
solitary  struggle  at  the  crossing  of  the  mountain 
brook.  The  victory  was  won  when  the  wounded 
man  felt  that  he  was  in  the  grasp  of  One  who  was 
mightier  than  himself,  and  cried  out,  '<  Tell  me,  I 
pray  Thee,  Thy  name ;  I  will  not  let  Thee  go  ex- 
cept Thou  bless  me."  The  victory  was  won  when 
Jacob  first  realized  that  he  was  in  the  hands  of  God 
and  then  felt  and  uttered  the  intense  desire  to  know 
God  and  to  have  God's  blessing.  And  that,  if  I 
may  say  so,  was  what  God  wanted.  That  is  why 
He    met    His   servant   in   that   lonely   place   and 


52  Life  Indeed 

wrestled  with  him  till  the  morning  broke.  It  was 
the  man — not  God — who  was  conquered.  And  as 
he  passed  over  Penuel,  at  sunrise,  he  was  a  new 
man.  He  was  lame  from  the  sore  struggle,  but  he 
said  ''I  have  seen  God  face  to  face,"  and  he  was 
God's  man  from  that  hour  onward  forever. 

Now  in  this  strange  and  somewhat  perplexing 
story  we  have  a  parable  of  a  common  experience. 
* '  In  that  mysterious  messenger  who  contended  with 
the  first  Israelite,  we  see,"  as  an  able  writer  has 
said,  'Hhe  whole  method  of  God  in  the  education 
of  men  ; — the  girding  circumstances,  the  encom- 
passing ideas  and  influences,  the  surrounding  moral 
and  spiritual  forces,  the  arms  of  personal  affection 
that  hold  us  fast,  the  power  of  the  beloved  Teacher 
that  gathers  about  us,  the  grasp  of  Christ,  the  great 
wrestle  of  God  Himself.  The  whole  universe 
comes  to  us  through  that  symbolic  presence,  with 
its  infinite  power  locked  round  us,  with  the  pull 
and  the  twist  and  the  uplift  of  the  divine  love, 
ready  to  impart  an  eternal  good  as  soon  as  human 
nature  shall  have  been  sufficiently  roused  to  re- 
ceive it." 

To  appreciate  this  we  must  in  the  first  place  rec- 
ognize the  fact  that  God  has  designs  upon  us.  He 
has  a  work  for  us  to  do,  an  office  for  us  to  fill. 
The  humblest  life  has  as  truly  its  place  in  the  di- 
vine order  as  the  mightiest.  The  least  of  us  is  as 
plainly  present  as  the  greatest  to  His  eye.  But  if 
we  are  to  be  fitted  for  His  uses,  we  must  yield  our- 


God  Wrestling  with  Man         63 

selves  to  His  control.  We  must  come  into  per- 
sonal contact  with  Him.  We  must  recognize  His 
power.  We  must  have  His  blessing.  We  must 
receive  from  Him  the  new  name  we  are  to  bear, 
and  must  feel  that  we  belong  to  Him. 

Now  there  are  many  of  us  for  whom  such  sur- 
render and  submission  are  not  easy.  He  is  not 
very  real  to  us.  Our  eyes  have  never  seen  Him. 
Our  hands  have  never  touched  His  powerful  and 
gentle  hand.  We  have  never  felt  the  strong  em- 
brace of  His  encircling  love.  And  there  is  only 
silence  when  we  listen  for  His  voice.  It  is  hard  for 
us  therefore  to  subject  our  wills  to  His,  to  throw 
away  our  self-confidence  and  cast  ourselves  on  His 
protection,  to  give  up  the  attempt  to  find  or  make 
our  own  way  in  life,  and  let  Him  send  us  where  He 
chooses.  We  have  had  our  own  way  so  long,  have 
followed  the  beckoning  of  our  own  ambition,  have 
ministered  to  our  own  wants,  and  pursued  our  own 
immediate  advantage ;  we  have  so  long  been  plan- 
ning and  laboring  for  ourselves  that  it  is  not  easy  to 
give  ourselves  up  to  the  guidance  and  the  service 
of  Him  to  whom  we  rightfully  belong. 

And  that  is  why  God  has  to  wrestle  with  us  in 
order  that  we  may  learn  how  real  and  how  near  He 
is,  may  have  a  just  appreciation  of  His  power,  may 
yield  our  wills  to  His,  and  so  may  be  prepared  to 
receive  His  blessing.  He  meets  us,  it  may  be,  as 
He  met  His  servant  of  old,  in  some  dark  and  soli- 
tary place.     It  is  a  crisis  in  our  life.     A  new  chap- 


54  Life  Indeed 

ter  in  our  personal  history  is  about  to  be  begun. 
We  are  stepping  from  boyhood  into  manhood,  are 
passing  from  school  or  college  into  active  life,  are 
making  some  grave  decision  which  will  change  all 
the  complexion  of  the  years  that  are  to  come. 
Then  it  is  that  God  meets  us.  He  throws  His 
strong  arms  round  us.  He  tries  to  force  us  to  our 
knees.  He  seeks  to  make  us  realize  that  we  are 
His,  and  submit  our  stubborn  wills  to  His  control. 
It  is  a  momentous  hour.  All  the  memories  of  years 
gone  by  come  back  to  us, — impressions  made  upon 
us  in  our  childhood,  resolutions  formed  and  broken, 
convictions  of  duty  that  we  have  put  aside,  solemn 
and  repeated  admonitions  of  conscience  Avhich  we 
have  disregarded ;  they  return  with  overwhelming 
power,  as  God's  Spirit  strives  with  us  once  more 
and  seeks  to  force  us  at  last  to  give  ourselves  to 
Him.  To  how  many  a  man  is  such  an  experience 
the  turning-point  from  which  a  new  life  dates.  He 
feels  that  he  too  has  seen  God  face  to  face,  and  he 
rises  up  a  new  man  and  goes  forth  with  the  light 
and  peace  of  heaven  in  his  soul. 

Such  an  experience  seems  distinctly  to  repeat 
that  by  which  the  Supplanter  was  transformed  into 
the  Patriarch.  But  not  every  one  comes  thus 
clearly  and  consciously  in  contact  with  God.  We 
are  sometimes  aware  that  there  is  an  invisible  power 
grappling  with  us,  of  whose  nature  and  whose 
name  alike  we  are  ignorant.  It  buffets  us  when  we 
are  tempted  to  do  wrong.     It  sets  before  us  higher 


God  Wrestling  with  Man         55 

ends  than  those  we  are  pursuing.  It  makes  us  dis- 
contented with  ourselves.  It  puts  a  certain  con- 
straint upon  our  evil  passions.  It  arouses  our 
purer  and  nobler  desires.  It  reveals  to  us  the  hol- 
lowness  of  an  aimless  or  a  selfish  life.  It  appeals 
to  our  better  nature,  and  seems  trying  to  make  us 
obedient  to  this.  We  feel  that  it  is  seeking  not  to 
hold  us  down  but  to  lift  us  up.  And  yet  so  gentle 
is  its  grasp  that  we  often  succeed  in  shaking  it  off. 
Even  when  we  are  distinctly  conscious  that  our  true 
wisdom  lies  in  yielding  to  it,  we  resent  its  mild  con- 
straint, assert  our  freedom,  and  go  our  way  un- 
blessed. 

And  oftener  still  we  do  not  recognize  any  such 
unseen  presence  in  our  lives.  The  thought  that 
God  is  wrestling  with  us,  seeking  to  subdue  our 
way\vard  wills  to  His  and  to  induce  us  to  give  our- 
selves to  Him,  does  not  so  much  as  occur  to  us 
while  the  current  of  our  life  flows  smoothly  on.  It 
is  indeed  hard  to  associate  the  smiling  bounty  of 
His  providence,  the  gracious  message  of  His  word, 
the  kindly  influences  of  Christian  friendships  and 
examples,  the  hallowed  power  of  the  familiar  insti- 
tutions of  religion — I  say  it  is  hardly  natural  to 
connect  these  with  a  divine  desire  to  conquer  our 
pride  and  passion  and  self-will,  and  make  us  ready 
to  bear  and  do  what  God  requires  of  us.  But  it  is 
seldom  by  violence  that  He  seeks  to  conquer  men. 
That  would  be  easy  for  Him.  The  mere  touch  of 
His  finger  is  enough  to  make  us  cringe  and  cower. 


56  Life  Indeed 

And  He  sometimes  lets  us  feel  it.  If  He  cannot 
subdue  us  by  love,  He  sometimes  makes  us  appre- 
ciate His  power.  But  what  He  wants  of  us  is  not 
an  abject  but  a  loving  and  trustful  submission.  It 
is  not  His  desire  that  we  should  yield  to  Him  be- 
cause we  are  not  strong  enough  to  oppose  Him,  but 
rather  because  at  last  we  know  Him,  and  know  that 
He  is  worthy  to  be  loved  and  trusted.  The  pur- 
pose of  the  touch  of  power  is  not  to  terrify  and 
crush  us.  It  is  rather  to  make  us  realize  that  He 
with  whom  we  have  to  do  is  no  mere  man,  but  one 
whom  it  is  both  wise  and  safe  for  us  to  confide  in 
and  submit  to.  It  is  at  once  a  revelation  and  a  re- 
assurance. But  there  is  love  behind  it.  It  is  out 
of  His  great  love  for  us  that  God  enters  into  this 
divine  wrestle  with  us.  If  He  can  conquer  us  by 
gentleness  He  will.  If  He  can  win  our  faith  and 
love  without  our  knowing  that  He  has  twined  His 
mighty  arms  about  us,  He  will  do  this.  But  all 
the  benign  influences  that  are  acting  upon  us,  in 
the  sphere  of  our  own  thoughts  as  well  as  in  the 
world  without,  are  elements  of  a  patient  and  de- 
termined effort  to  subdue  our  selfishness,  to  break 
down  our  pride,  to  make  us  realize  that  we  belong 
to  Him,  to  induce  us  to  trust  and  to  obey  Him. 

Our  common  habit  of  distinguishing  secular  from 
sacred  things  often  prevents  us  from  recognizing 
this.  The  distinction  is  an  important  one.  And 
yet  the  whole  world  belongs  to  God  and  He  is  ac- 
tive in  it  everywhere.     And  there  is  nothing  in  it 


God  Wrestling  with  Man         57 

which  He  may  not  use  as  a  means  of  winning  man's 
confidence  and  love.  For  what  other  purpose  is  it 
really  that  He  has  built  the  solid  globe  and  placed 
us  on  it,  that  He  has  arched  above  it  the  starry  sky, 
that  He  makes  the  seasons  pour  their  bounty  into 
our  hands  ?  And  to  what  other  end  does  He  direct 
the  events  that  befall  us  and  in  which  we  have  our 
part  ?  Health  and  sickness,  prosperity  and  disap- 
pointment, poverty  and  wealth,  labor  and  rest,  the 
studies  that  enlarge  our  thought,  the  honorable  oc- 
cupations that  employ  our  time, — what  are  they  all 
but  different  phases  of  the  great  divine  purpose 
which  underlies  our  life  ?  If  God  is  in  anything. 
He  is  in  everything.  All  times  and  places  are  open 
to  Him.  He  may  meet  us  at  any  hour  and  any- 
where. Nay,  He  never  intermits  His  gracious 
striving  with  us,  but  by  night  as  well  as  day,  with 
unwearied  patience,  puts  His  continual  pressure  on 
us,  if  so  be  that  at  last  we  may  recognize  His  right 
to  us  and  yield  ourselves  to  His  control. 

Then  only  are  we  prepared  to  receive  His  bless- 
ing. As  you  read  the  story  of  this  memorable 
scene  in  Jacob's  life,  it  seems  to  me  that  you  can 
touch  its  turning-point.  As  he  remained  at  night 
alone,  his  nerves  strung  with  keen  expectation  of 
what  was  to  befall  upon  the  morrow,  there  wrestled 
a  man  with  him  till  the  breaking  of  the  day.  Be- 
lieving at  first  that  it  was  a  man,  not  only,  but  an 
enemy,  who  had  come  to  oppose  his  entering  on 
his  inheritance,  he  struggled  with  all  his  might  to 


58  Life  Indeed 

overcome  him.  But  at  a  certain  moment  the  mys- 
terious stranger  put  forth  his  finger  and  ' '  touched 
the  hollow  of  his  thigh ;  and  the  hollow  of  Jacob's 
thigh  was  strained."  And  the  dawn  began  to 
brighten  in  the  east.  Then  it  was  that  it  also 
dawned  upon  his  mind  that  it  was  not  an  enemy 
but  a  friend  whose  arms  encircled  him.  He  no 
longer  sought  to  overthrow  or  to  escape  from  Him. 
He  sought  rather  to  hold  Him  fast  till  he  should 
obtain  His  blessing.  And  he  did  obtain  it.  *<  He 
blessed  him  there."  That  was  the  purpose  for 
which  he  had  come.  But  if  so,  why  the  long, 
furious  struggle  ?  Not  because  the  blessing  must 
be  wrung  from  Him  against  His  will,  but  because 
the  attitude  of  the  Patriarch  must  first  be  changed 
from  antagonism  to  entreaty,  from  a  desire  to  con- 
quer to  a  willingness  to  obey.  The  change  came 
at  the  moment  when  He  felt  that  he  was  fight- 
ing against  God  and  that  this  was  vain  and  worse 
than  vain. 

Any  man  who  would  have  God's  blessing  must 
be  prepared  for  it  by  a  similar  recognition  of  Him 
and  a  similar  submission  to  His  will.  He  is  more 
ready  to  bestow  than  we  are  to  receive  the  blessing. 
But  so  long  as  we  stand  out  against  Him,  He  will 
not,  cannot,  grant  it  to  us.  We  must  first  learn 
the  mystery  of  life,  so  far  at  least  as  to  perceive 
that  it  is  He  who  has  beset  us  behind  and  before, 
and  has  laid  His  hand  upon  us.  Realize  that  along 
all  the  way  that   you  have  travelled,    in   the   far 


God  Wrestling  with  Man         59 

countries  where  you  have  been  living,  in  weary 
hours  of  trial  and  discouragement,  God  has  been 
with  you,  though  you  may  not  have  discerned  Him, 
and  has  chosen  and  marked  you  for  His  own.  He 
has  been  wrestling  with  you  patiently  and  lovingly 
for  many  years.  He  has  sought  by  the  prosperity 
and  happiness  that  He  has  sent  you  to  make  you 
conscious  of  His  tender  love  and  care,  and  to  draw 
you  to  Him  by  the  cords  of  gratitude.  And  when 
you  failed  to  perceive  Him  in  the  daylight.  He  has 
met  you  in  the  darkness.  He  has  thrown  His 
strong  arm  around  you,  and  still  you  have  not 
known  Him.  He  has  wounded  you — He  has  had 
to  wound  you — because  you  struggled  against  Him. 
Can  you  not  now  see  that  it  is  He  ?  And  is  it  not 
idle  to  resist  Him  ?  O,  if  men  only  knew  that  God 
is  not  their  enemy  but  their  best  friend  !  If  instead 
of  holding  Him  off  or  trying  to  break  away  from 
His  embrace,  they  would  cling  to  Him,  as  Jacob 
did,  exclaiming  "I  will  not  let  Thee  go,  except 
Thou  bless  me  !  "  As  soon  as  that  prayer  is  offered 
the  blessing  comes  and  the  morning  breaks.  There 
would  have  been  no  need  of  the  long  struggle  if  the 
soul  had  only  yielded  sooner  to  Him  whose  one 
supreme  desire  is  to  bless  and  save  it. 

And  yet  one  prayer  of  Jacob  was  denied.  *'  Tell 
me,"  he  said,  ''I  pray  Thee,  Thy  name."  He 
did  not  tell  him,  but  answered,  ''Wherefore  dost 
thou  ask  after  My  name?"  He  did  not,  because 
He  could  not,  tell  him.     Even  Jacob  was  not  pre- 


60  Life  Indeed 

pared  for  that  supreme  revelation  of  God.  It  was 
enough  that  he  should  know  Him  under  the  names 
by  which  He  had  already  revealed  Himself.  The 
world  was  not  then  prepared  to  know  Him  as  He 
really  was  and  as,  long  centuries  afterward,  He  was 
to  manifest  Himself  to  it.  Jacob  knew  that  he  had 
looked  upon  God's  face,  and  it  was  enough.  His 
nature  remained  hidden  from  him. 

It  is  given  to  us  to  speak  the  name  which  no  Pa- 
triarch or  Prophet  ever  heard.  God's  true  nature 
has  been  unfolded  to  us.  The  Christian  experience 
of  a  later  age  is  woven  into  the  symbolism  of  the 
ancient  story  in  those  verses  of  Charles  Wesley, 
which  were  based  upon  this  incident  in  Jacob's  life. 

Come,  O  Thou  Traveler  unknown, 
"Whom  still  I  hold,  but  cannot  see, 

My  company  before  is  gone, 

And  I  am  left  alone  with  Thee ; 

With  Thee  all  night  I  mean  to  stay, 

And  wrestle  till  the  break  of  day. 

I  need  not  tell  Thee  who  I  am, 

My  misery  or  sin  declare  ; 
Thyself  hast  called  me  by  my  name ; 

Look  on  Thy  hands  and  read  it  there ! 
But  who,  I  ask  Thee,  who  art  Thou  ? 
Tell  me  Thy  name,  and  tell  me  now. 

Wilt  Thou  not  yet  to  me  reveal 
Thy  new,  unutterable  Name  ? 
Tell  me,  I  still  beseech  Thee,  tell : 


God  Wrestling  with  Man  61 

To  know  it  now  resolved  I  am  : 
Wrestling,  I  will  not  let  Thee  go 
Till  I  Thy  Name,  Thy  Nature  know. 

Yield  to  me  now,  for  I  am  weak, 

But  confident  in  self-despair ; 
Speak  to  my  heart,  in  blessings  speak, 

Be  conquered  by  my  instant  prayer  ! 
Speak,  or  Thou  never  hence  shalt  move, 
And  tell  me  if  Thy  Name  is  Love  ! 

My  prayer  hath  power  with  God ;  the  grace 

Unspeakable  I  now  receive ; 
Through  faith  I  see  Thee  face  to  face, 

I  see  Thee  face  to  face,  and  live ; 
In  vain  I  have  not  wept  and  strove. 
Thy  Nature,  and  Thy  Name,  is  Love. 

I  know  Thee,  Saviour,  who  Thou  art, 
Jesus,  the  feeble  sinner's  Friend ! 

Nor  wilt  Thou  with  the  night  depart, 
But  stay,  and  love  me  to  the  end ; 

Thy  mercies  never  shall  remove. 

Thy  Nature,  and  Thy  Name,  is  Love. 

Contented  now  upon  my  thigh 
I  halt,  till  life's  short  journey  end. 

All  helplessness,  all  weakness,  I 

On  Thee  alone  for  strength  depend ; 

Nor  have  I  power  from  Thee  to  move ; 

Thy  Nature,  and  Thy  Name,  is  Love. 

Yes,  that  is  the  name  which  could  not  be  dis- 
closed to  Jacob,  but  it  is  that  by  which  we  now 
know  God.  It  is  the  Infinite  Love  which  is  wres- 
thng  with  us,  trying  to  win  our  recognition,  our 


62  Life  Indeed 

confidence,  our  responsive  love.  What  a  beautiful 
interpretation  it  gives  to  life  to  think  of  it  in  this 
way ;  to  see,  not  only  in  what  we  are  accustomed 
to  call  religious  influences,  but  in  all  the  good  in- 
fluences by  which  we  are  enfolded,  expressions  of 
God's  loving  desire  and  purpose  to  draw  and  hold 
us  to  Himself  in  order  that  He  may  bestow  His 
blessing  on  us  !  How  strange  it  seems  that  we 
should  not  recognize  Him,  that  we  should  ever  re- 
sist Him  !  What  a  blessed  thing  it  is  that  He  con- 
tinues to  strive  with  us,  instead  of  suddenly  vanish- 
ing from  us  and  leaving  us  in  utter  darkness  !  And 
what  a  joyous  thing,  when  His  blessing  has  been 
gained,  to  go  forth  to  meet  the  new  day,  the  new 
duties,  the  new  responsibilities,  feeling  that  we  are 
His  and  He  is  ours  forever  !  Here  is  the  secret  of 
peace,  the  secret  of  power,  in  the  surrender  of  one's 
soul  and  of  one's  life  to  God,  and  in  the  continu- 
ing, confiding  fellowship  with  God  that  follows  it. 
Henceforth  the  way  is  plain,  the  burden  light.  We 
shall  never  again  mistake  the  hand  that  touches 
ours.  Though  the  darkness  may  gather  over  us 
we  shall  know  that  the  mightiest  and  best  of  friends 
is  with  us.  And  when  day  breaks  at  last,  we  shall 
go,  not  halting,  but  with  bounding  steps,  over  the 
river,  into  the  Promised  Land. 


THE  RESTORING  OF  SOULS 


He  restoreth  my  soul. — Psalm  xxiii.  3. 


IV 

THE  RESTORING  OF  SOULS 

There  is  only  one  restorer  of  souls,  but  there  are 
multitudes  of  souls  which  want  restoring.  We  do 
not  need  to  have  formed  any  theories  of  human 
nature  or  to  have  been  trained  in  any  theological 
school ;  we  only  need  to  look  out  upon  society,  or 
perhaps  to  look  in  upon  our  own  hearts,  in  order 
to  see  that  there  is  here  a  great  and  difficult  and 
delicate  work  to  be  done,  whether  there  is  any 
power  which  is  able  to  do  it  or  not. 

For  we  have  a  more  or  less  definite  idea  of  what 
a  soul  ought  to  be — of  what  our  souls  were  meant 
to  be,  when  they  came  from  the  creative  hand  of 
God,  and  were  entrusted,  if  I  may  say  so,  to  our 
keeping  and  care.  They  were  surely  intended  both 
for  activity  and  for  enjoyment,  but  their  enjoyment 
was  meant  to  be  derived  not  from  those  objects 
which  appeal  to  the  senses,  but  from  those  which 
are  spiritual,  like  the  soul  itself;  and  their  activity 
was  meant  to  be  spontaneous  and  free.  They 
were  designed  to  do  easily  and  well,  without  fric- 
tion or  conflict,  the  work  assigned  them.  They 
were  designed  to  live  in  harmony  with  them- 
selves, with  nature  and  with  God.  They  were 
made  to  grow,  but  to  grow  not  by  a  continual 
65 


66  Life  Indeed 

battling  against  opposition,  by  a  series  of  spasmodic 
struggles,  followed  by  reaction  and  exhaustion,  but 
by  a  steady,  harmonious,  natural  development,  into 
an  enlarged  capacity,  a  fuller  strength,  a  diviner 
beauty.  That  certainly  is  the  law  which  elsewhere 
prevails  in  the  universe  which  God  has  made.  The 
planets  swing  smoothly  on  their  bright  circles,  and 
there  are  no  discords  in  the  music  of  the  spheres. 
Every  living  thing  is  finely  fitted  for  the  part  as- 
signed it  in  the  great  drama  of  existence.  There 
is  nothing  more  astounding  to  us,  and  yet  nothing 
more  characteristic  of  the  infinite  resources  of  skill 
and  power  in  the  mind  and  will  of  the  Most  High, 
than  the  manner  in  which  each  form  of  life  adapts 
itself  to  new  conditions  in  the  ceaseless  transforma- 
tions of  the  material  world,  unfolding  new  capacities 
and  putting  forth  new  powers,  in  the  upward  move- 
ment which  is  everywhere  exhibited.  Everything 
within  us  and  around  us  is  in  motion,  but  whirling 
atoms  and  circling  suns  are  alike  under  a  law  of 
progress.  There  is  no  pause,  there  is  no  diversion, 
there  is  no  waste  of  material  or  of  energy.  But 
silently  and  constantly  the  new  creation  is  building 
itself  out  of  the  old. 

But  when  we  look  into  the  life  of  human  souls, 
we  seem  to  find  not  harmonious  development  but 
irregularity  and  discord,  waste  of  power,  confusion, 
and  the  continual  need  of  restoration  into  the  di- 
vine order,  which  has  in  some  way  been  lost. 

Here,  for  instance,  is  a  young  and  eager  spirit, 


The  Pwcstorlns  of  Souls  67 


D 


which  has  entered  life  full  of  hope  and  courage  and 
energy,  with  pure  tastes  and  generous  affections 
and  high  ideals,  enthusiastic  in  its  pursuit  of  that 
which  is  noble  and  true,  with  a  profound  senti- 
ment of  the  grandeur  of  life,  the  sacredness  of 
duty,  the  nearness  of  God,  and  with  the  strong  de- 
sire to  make  its  pathway  through  the  world  bright, 
not  with  the  lustre  of  material  success,  but  with  the 
glory  of  a  character  and  a  career  which  men  shall 
honor  and  God  approve.  But  soon  it  is  caught  by 
some  gust  of  temptation  and  whirled  off,  like  a 
wandering  star,  out  of  the  course  which  it  was 
appointed  to  follow,  toward  some  utterly  selfish  and 
unworthy  end.  On  this  its  powers  are  all  concen- 
trated. The  fine  balance  of  its  faculties  is  lost. 
It  becomes  narrow  and  sharp,  perhaps  unscrupu- 
lous and  cruel.  It  needs  to  be  brought  back  to  its 
orbit  again,  to  be  restored  to  the  line  of  orderly, 
self-restrained,  harmonious  development,  from 
which  it  has  gone  so  far  astray. 

Here  is  another  soul  which  has  become  dis- 
couraged. It  has  not  been  misled  by  enthusiasm 
or  betrayed  by  self-confidence.  It  has  fully  ap- 
preciated the  dangers  surrounding  it  and  the  diffi- 
culties that  lie  in  its  way.  But  in  spite  of  these  it 
has  honestly  and  faithfully  tried  to  make  something 
of  itself,  and  it  seems  doomed  to  failure.  It  finds 
the  world  a  cold,  hard,  selfish  place.  It  has  been 
baffled  by  its  enemies  and  deceived  by  its  friends. 
Its   most  careful  plans  have  fallen  to  pieces;  its 


68  Life  Indeed 

sudden  inspirations  have  proved  bitter  delusions. 
It  feels  as  if  there  were  no  place  for  it  in  the  Babel 
of  human  voices  and  passions,  where  it  is  lonely 
and  helpless.  And  it  longs  for  the  day  to  end,  and 
for  the  quiet  night  to  come.  Or  else  it  feels  as  if 
it  must  give  way,  abandon  the  principles  to  which 
it  is  struggling  to  keep  true,  throw  itself  into  the 
torrent,  and  let  that  bear  it  whithersoever  it  will. 
It  needs,  you  see,  to  be  restored  to  courage. 

Another  soul  has  lost  its  faith  in  men,  in  God,  in 
all  things  spiritual.  It  has  been  forced  to  see  the 
darker  sides  of  human  nature,  its  meanness,  its 
insincerity,  its  sensuality,  its  predominant  selfish- 
ness, and  it  no  longer  believes  in  any  real  disinter- 
estedness, in  any  incorruptible  integrity,  among 
mankind.  And  God  has  come  to  seem  further  and 
further  away.  He  does  not  appear  to  be  accessible 
to  prayer.  His  providence  seems  so  unequal  that 
the  soul  has  grown  to  think  that  there  is  no  provi- 
dence, or  else  it  cannot  reconcile  this  with  the 
government  of  the  world  by  natural  law.  It  has 
found  difficulties  in  believing  in  a  divine  revelation, 
and  does  not  believe  in  it.  A  divine  incarnation 
is  more  mysterious  still,  and  faith  in  that  is  swept 
away.  Immortality  itself  has  at  last  become 
doubtful.  And  with  the  loss  of  all  these  the  very 
foundations  of  morality  have  been  undermined. 
There  is  but  one  step  further  which  such  a  soul  can 
take  in  this  direction ;  it  is  to  doubt  its  own  ex- 
istence.    Evidently  it  needs  to  be  restored  to  faith. 


The  Restoring  of  Souls  69 

Or  if  it  has  kept  its  faith,  it  has  lost  its  joyful- 
ness.  Its  childish  mirth  it  expected  to  lose,  but 
under  repeated  shocks  of  sorrow  its  elasticity  of 
spirit  is  gone.  One  by  one  the  dearest  objects  of  its 
love  have  been  taken  from  it,  and  it  has  been  left 
forlorn  and  desolate.  It  has  not  lost  its  courage,  but 
its  courage  has  become  a  matter  of  simple  resolute- 
ness of  will.  It  is  submissive  and  patient,  but  it  is 
broken-hearted.  It  has  no  interest  in  life  except  to 
do  its  duty  till  the  end  shall  come.  It  may  brighten 
into  a  sudden  cheerfulness,  but  it  is  only  now  and 
then  and  for  an  instant  that  the  sun  breaks  through 
the  clouds.  Its  prevailing  temper  is  one  of  sadness, 
and  hope  is  buried  by  the  side  of  joy.  Is  it  pos- 
sible that  they  can  ever  be  restored  to  life  ? 

Then  another  soul  needs  restoration  into  peace 
with  itself.  It  is  full  of  abounding  and  eager  life, 
full  of  the  keen  joy  of  living,  but  it  is  conscious 
that  it  is  not  doing  the  best  work  that  it  is  capable 
of  doing;  it  is  wasting  its  energies  or  a  part  of 
them ;  it  is  divided  in  its  ideals  and  its  endeavors, 
and  it  is  aware  of  a  conflict  going  on  all  the  time 
within  it.  It  may  be  simply  restless,  and  hardly 
understand  its  own  complaint,  or  it  may  be  dis- 
satisfied, ashamed,  even  furiously  indignant  with 
itself.  It  may  heap  upon  itself  all  manner  of  bit- 
ter reproaches  and  form  all  manner  of  good  resolu- 
tions. But  there  it  is,  disturbed  by  the  ancient 
conflict  between  ''I  would  not"  and  ''I  do,"  be- 
tween principle  and  desire,  between  purpose  and 


70  Life  Indeed 

performance,  and  it  longs  for  the  peace  of  a  soul 
that  is  in  full  harmony  with  itself. 

Or  it  may  be  peace  with  God  that  it  desires. 
There  was  a  time  when  it  loved  Him  and  strove  to 
do  His  will.  But  a  great  temptation  came  and  it 
fell, — fell  into  an  open  and  dreadful  sin.  In  one 
dark  and  terrible  moment,  by  one  swift  and  shame- 
ful act,  it  seemed  to  cut  itself  off  from  Him,  and 
the  sense  of  His  anger  now  rests  upon  it.  It  has 
mourned,  how  often  and  how  bitterly,  over  its  one 
great  fault ;  it  has  repented  of  it  with  keen  self-re- 
proach and  floods  of  tears.  But  it  cannot  forgive 
itself;  how  then  can  it  hope  that  God  will  forgive 
it?  "What  possible  restoration,"  it  cries,  "into 
His  love,  can  there  be  for  me  ?  ' ' 

Or  if  its  happiness  and  its  hope  are  not  blighted 
by  one  conspicuous  act  of  wrong,  it  has  come  into 
bondage  to  a  sinful  habit.  Little  by  little  this  has 
been  tightening  its  fetters  upon  it,  its  very  strug- 
gles to  escape  only  fixing  these  more  firmly,  and 
making  it  more  vividly  conscious  of  its  captiv- 
ity. But  the  habit  has  not  yet  become  a  nature ; 
the  imprisoned  soul  is  like  a  caged  bird,  which  has 
not  lost  the  sense  of  the  free  air  that  it  was  made 
for,  and  still  struggles  to  escape.  Who  shall  re- 
store it  to  liberty,  that  it  may  spread  its  wings  and 
soar  into  the  large  and  joyous  life  of  those  creatures 
of  God,  whom  Satan  has  never  caught  and  bound  ? 

And,  once  more,  for  I  need  not  multiply  these 
illustrations,  how  many  souls  of  us  there  are  which 


The  Restoring  of  Souls  71 

want  to  be  restored  to  purity  ?  We  are  not  guilty 
of  flagrant  vices,  we  are  not  perhaps  under  the  do- 
minion of  degrading  habits,  but  we  are  stained, — 
spotted  by  the  world.  The  freshness  of  our  inno- 
cence is  gone.  We  have  become  familiar  with 
many  forms  of  sin.  Our  consciences  have  become 
less  sensitive ;  the  light  that  is  in  us  has  been  grow- 
ing dim.  Our  judgments  of  character  have  been 
growing  less  severe ;  our  standards  less  pure  and 
high.  We  look  with  allowance  on  many  things  at 
which  we  should  once  have  revolted  j  we  count  it 
nothing  to  omit  many  things  which  we  should  once 
have  thought  it  a  shame  to  neglect.  We  used  to 
be  devout,  but  we  have  become  indifferent  or 
scornful.  We  have  lost  our  gentleness  and  become 
hard-hearted;  we  have  lost  our  earnestness  and 
become  flippant  or  cynical.  Others  observe  and 
deplore  the  change  that  has  taken  place  in  us,  but 
no  one  knows,  as  well  as  we  do,  how  greatly  our 
purity  has  suffered,  how  deeply  these  stains  have 
struck  into  our  souls.  This  then  is  what  we  want 
above  all  other  things,  to  be  made  clean  again,  to 
be  restored  to  purity. 

Now  we  need  not,  I  think,  go  any  more  pro- 
foundly than  this  into  what  may  be  called  the 
pathology  of  souls,  to  perceive  that  the  work  of 
restoring  them  is  a  very  important  and  difficult  and 
dangerous  task.  It  is  important  because  a  soul 
that  is  diseased,  that  is  out  of  harmony  with  itself, 
with   nature,    and    with    God,  causes   in   the  first 


72  Life  Indeed 

place  an  immense  waste  of  moral  power.  Think 
of  the  almost  measureless  capacities  which  a  pure 
and  perfect  soul  possesses,  for  knowledge,  for  happi- 
ness, for  high  and  holy  service  of  God,  within  the 
sphere  of  this  present  life  and  in  the  vaster  spheres 
of  the  life  to  come ;  and  then  consider  the  incal- 
culable loss  of  possible  good,  which  comes  from 
the  paralyzing  of  its  powers,  when  it  is  spending 
its  force  in  conflict  with  itself  or  lying  in  the 
lethargy  of  doubt  or  despondency  or  fear.  Or 
rather,  since  the  great  law  of  the  conservation  of 
energy  holds  true  in  the  moral  as  in  the  physical 
government  of  God,  the  energies  which  should 
have  been  directed  to  the  building  up  of  character, 
the  advancement  of  God's  kingdom,  the  promo- 
tion of  righteousness  and  peace,  become  energies 
of  destruction,  working  toward  the  overthrow  of 
all  moral  order,  toward  the  ruin  of  the  soul  in 
which  they  are  operating,  and  of  all  other  souls 
upon  which  it  acts.  The  restoring  of  a  soul  is  a 
matter  of  the  utmost  consequence  for  its  own  sake, 
by  reason  of  the  immortal  joys  that  it  misses  and 
of  the  inevitable  miseries  that  it  suffers  if  it  con- 
tinues unrestored.  But  the  whole  moral  universe 
is  concerned  in  it  as  well,  because  of  the  beneficent 
activity  which  is  wasted  and  the  destructive  influ- 
ence which  is  let  loose,  when  a  human  soul  breaks 
away  from  its  orbit  and  starts  off  in  a  wild  and 
wanton  career. 

And   yet  it  is  no  easy  matter  to  restore  a  soul. 


The  Restoring  of  Souls  Y3 

I!  you  do  not  think  so,  try  to  do  it.  Go  to  one 
that  is  crushed  by  a  great  sorrow,  and  see  if  your 
tenderest  sympathy,  your  most  soothing  and  com- 
forting words,  can  bring  "the  light  of  smiles  again 
to  lids  that  overflow  with  tears."  Go  to  one  that 
is  despondent,  and  see  if  your  exhortations  to  cour- 
age and  your  cheerful  tones  can  lift  from  the  bur- 
dened spirit  the  weight  of  gloom  that  has  settled 
upon  it.  You  might  almost  as  well  try  to  draw 
back  the  curtains  of  the  midnight  and  bring  forth 
the  sun  from  the  chambers  of  the  east.  How  much 
less  then  is  it  within  the  compass  of  any  human 
power,  to  restore  purity  to  the  soul  that  is  conscious 
of  guilt,  or  peace  to  one  that  is  tossed  to  and  fro 
by  the  waves  of  an  inward  unrest,  or  the  sense  of 
God's  forgiveness  to  one  which  has  come  to  feel 
the  sense  of  God's  wrath  ! 

Nay,  it  is  an  office  as  dangerous  as  it  is  difficult. 
For  the  peril  is  that  in  delivering  it  from  one  evil, 
you  will  plunge  it  into  another,  and  not  restore  it 
after  all.  You  may  save  it  from  despondency,  but 
it  will  be  by  leading  it  to  take  a  light  view  of  its 
failures.  You  may  give  it  peace,  but  it  will  be  by 
destroying  its  aspirations  after  purity.  You  may 
make  bold  to  speak  for  God  and  assure  it  that  its 
apprehensions  of  His  anger  are  superstitious  de- 
lusions, but  if  you  persuade  it  to  accept  your  words, 
you  will  have  destroyed  its  reverence  for  Him  and 
have  brought  confusion  into  all  its  ideas  of  the 
principles  on  which  His  government  is  based.     And 


Y4  Life  Indeed 

this  incalculable  mischief  men  are  all  the  time 
doing  when  they  try  to  restore  one  another's  souls. 
Sometimes  they  mistake  the  true  nature  of  the  dis- 
order ;  sometimes  their  fatal  error  is  in  applying  a 
remedy  which  only  aggravates  the  evil.  You  ob- 
serve, for  instance,  on  the  face  of  a  friend  a  shadow 
of  anxiety  or  care,  which  betokens  a  soul  that  is 
ill  at  ease,  and  in  order  to  bring  back  the  old  ex- 
pression of  careless  gaiety,  you  invent  distraction, 
and  urge  rest,  amusement,  change  of  scene.  But 
the  peace  that  you  perhaps  succeed  in  restoring  is 
not  the  peace  of  God,  which  His  Spirit  was  ready 
to  bestow ;  it  is  the  peace  of  spiritual  indifference 
and  death.  You  may  have  destroyed  the  soul  that 
you  desired  to  heal.  How  often  sorrow  is  sent  as 
a  divine  influence  to  make  a  heedless  mind  thought- 
ful or  a  hard  heart  tender ;  to  bring  a  soul  face  to 
face,  as  it  were,  with  the  realities  of  the  unseen 
world  ;  to  awaken  desires  that  had  been  slumbering, 
and  open  again  capacities  that  had  been  choked  up 
by  earthly  pleasure  or  success.  But  your  first 
thought  is  to  restore  it  to  happiness,  if  you  can  do 
so,  though  you  can  do  so  only  by  restoring  it  to 
the  condition  of  religious  apathy,  from  which  the 
providence  of  God  has  aroused  it.  And  this  is 
why,  as  I  said,  the  restoration  of  a  soul  is  such  a 
delicate  thing.  It  is  a  task  too  vast  for  our  power 
and  too  fine  for  our  skill.  We  cannot  even  restore 
our  own  souls,  and  how  shall  we  succeed  in  restor- 
ing others? 


The  Restoring  of  Souls  75 

Is  it  not  a  comfort  then  to  know  that  He  who 
alone  is  equal  to  this  great  office  is  willing  to  per- 
form it  ?  It  is  a  divine  work,  and  divinely  does 
God  accomplish  it.  He  does  it  often  in  unnoticed 
ways,  by  a  power  as  silent  and  as  gradual,  as  that 
by  which  He  brings  back  the  earth  from  the  cold 
and  hard  desolation  of  winter,  into  the  bursting 
luxuriance  of  June.  But  He  does  it ;  He  does  it  in 
His  own  way ;  and  there  is  nothing  else  which  He 
is  so  intent  upon  doing.  He  did  not  make  the 
soul  of  man  to  be  a  destructive  force  in  the  uni- 
verse, at  variance  with  itself  and  at  enmity  with 
Him,  and  the  very  first  end  of  His  providence  and 
His  grace  is  to  bring  it  back  into  an  orderly  and 
harmonious  life. 

And  observe  how  He  does  this.  It  is,  first  of  all, 
by  revealing  Himself  to  it.  The  true  source  of  all 
the  disorders  of  souls  is  their  forgetfulness  of  God. 
They  have  lost  the  great  consciousness  that  they 
came  from  Him  and  are  to  return  to  Him  again, 
and  that  He  is  Himself  present  within  them.  The 
eye  has  become  blind  to  His  glory ;  the  ear  has  be- 
come deaf  to  His  voice.  And  that  is  why  one  has 
rushed  off  in  hot  chase  of  some  earthly  good, 
and  another  has  lost  hope  and  courage,  and  an- 
other is  borne  down  by  sorrow,  and  another  has 
been  swept  away  by  temptation,  and  all  have  be- 
come spotted  by  the  world.  It  is  because  they 
have  forgotten  Him  who  is  over  and  around  and 
within  them,  who  is  the  law  and  the  end  of  their 


76  Life  Indeed 

life,  who  is  their  very  life  itself.  And  so  when  He 
restores  a  soul,  it  is  to  this  first  that  He  restores  it, 
to  the  appreciation  of  the  fact  that  He  is,  that  it  is 
encompassed  and  animated  by  Him. 

Then  the  second  step  in  the  divine  process  of 
restoration  is  to  make  a  soul  aware  of  God's  love. 
Not  merely  from  Him  does  the  power  go  forth  by 
which  it  lives  and  moves,  but  He  is  watching  over 
it  with  a  fatherly  and  faithful  care.  It  is  not  lost 
to  His  view  amid  the  swarms  of  His  creatures,  but 
He  has  a  personal  knowledge  of  it.  All  its  wants 
and  its  weaknesses,  its  successes  and  its  failures,  its 
aspirations  and  its  discouragements  are  perfectly 
manifest  to  Him.  It  is  the  wonder  of  His  infinite 
nature  that  each  soul  is  as  plainly  present  to  Him, 
as  if  in  all  the  universe  it  were  the  only  soul.  And 
not  only  so,  but  He  has  a  purpose  for  it,  a  definite 
plan  for  its  life  and  action.  There  is  a  path  which 
He  has  meant  it  to  follow,  and  in  pursuing  that 
path  its  true  happiness  and  peace  are  found.  Its 
disorder  and  its  wretchedness  have  come  from  its 
deliberate  choosing  of  some  other  course  or  its  un- 
conscious wandering  away  from  that  which  He  has 
appointed  for  it.  And  it  cannot  be  restored  till  it 
has  learned  that  God  has  something  for  it  to  be  and 
do.  And  not  merely  that,  again,  but  far  as  it  has 
wandered  from  Him,  it  has  not  gone  beyond  the 
reach  of  His  love.  He  follows  it  still  with  a 
strong,  deep,  personal  affection,  and  longs  to  have 
it  return  to  its  duty  and  to  Him.     Now  it  is  by 


The  Restoring  of  Souls  Y7 

bringing  this  to  its  knowledge,  by  impressing  this 
upon  its  feeling,  that  He  seeks  to  restore  it  to  its 
true  relation  to  Himself,  and  so  to  establish  within 
it  His  own  peace  and  purity  and  joy. 

But  it  is  not  enough  that  it  should  know  and  feel 
this.  It  is  here  that  its  recovery  begins,  but  not 
here  that  it  is  completed.  For  then  He  sends  a 
holy  and  gracious  influence  upon  it,  the  influence 
of  His  own  Spirit,  to  bring  it  back  into  the  life  in 
Him  and  for  Him  from  which  it  has  gone  so  far 
astray.  Silently  but  mightily  that  Spirit  works 
upon  it,  not  as  a  rushing,  resistless  force,  but  as  an 
inward,  transforming  energy.  It  gives  birth  to  new 
aff"ections,  new  hopes,  new  desires.  It  begets  a 
fresh  courage  in  the  room  of  despondency.  It 
sheds  abroad  a  holy  and  heavenly  joy  in  the  place 
of  gloom  and  grief.  It  restores  strength  to  the 
fainting  spirit,  and  faith  to  the  heart  that  has 
ceased  to  trust.  It  subdues  the  will  that  has 
struggled  to  have  its  own  way,  and  makes  it  admit 
that  God's  way  is  best.  It  comes  to  the  soul  that 
is  crushed  and  broken  by  the  sense  of  sin,  and  it 
does  not  teach  it  that  sin  is  a  thing  of  no  conse- 
quence, to  be  banished  from  the  thoughts  as  quickly 
as  possible,  or  an  inherited  taint  for  which  we  are 
not  responsible,  or  a  disease  from  which  we  shall 
recover  by  some  natural  process.  But  it  leads  it  to 
see  in  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  its  only  and  its  all- 
sufhcient  Saviour.  It  leads  it  to  trust  in  Him  for 
pardon  and  to  look  to  Him  for  cleansing,  to  find  in 


78  Life  Indeed 

Him  the  cure  of  its  present  distresses  and  the  in- 
spiration of  its  future  character.  Not  merely  by 
the  revelation  of  Himself  in  His  being,  His  care, 
His  wise  purpose.  His  gracious  love,  does  God  re- 
store the  souls  that  have  fallen  out  of  harmony  with 
Him  and  themselves.  But  He  sends  upon  them 
His  Holy  Spirit  to  bring  them  back,  through  Him 
who  is  alone  *<the  Way." 

Is  it  not  plain  that  our  souls  need  to  be  thus  re- 
stored? Have  we  not  often  found  our  courage 
failing,  our  joy  overclouded  with  sorrow?  Have 
we  not  found  ourselves  swinging  off  from  our  true 
course  into  the  pursuit  of  ends  that  we  knew  to  be 
unworthy  of  us,  and  been  discontented  and  dis- 
tressed because  we  knew  it  was  all  so  wrong? 
Have  we  not,  perhaps,  found  our  faith  growing 
faint,  and  dreadful  doubts  of  God's  wisdom  and 
love  distracting  our  minds  ?  Are  we  not  conscious 
of  a  sharp  conflict  within  us  between  our  desires 
and  our  purposes,  or  between  our  purposes  and 
our  actual  conduct?  Do  we  not  tremble  some- 
times when  we  think  of  some  great  sin  that  we  have 
committed,  which  we  would  gladly  have  forgotten 
but  which  we  cannot  forget?  Are  we  not  in 
bondage  to  some  bad  habit  which  we  have  vainly 
struggled  to  throw  off?  Are  we  not  at  least  con- 
scious of  many  a  stain  which  has  fallen  upon  us  in 
our  passage  through  the  world  ?  However  it  may 
be  that  our  souls  have  become  what  they  are,  is  it 
not  evident  that  they  are  not  what  they  ought  to 


The  Restoring  of  Souls  79 

be  ?  We  have  broken  away  from  the  divine  order. 
We  are  out  of  harmony  with  ourselves  and  with 
God.     We  need  to  be  restored  to  this  again. 

And  how  shall  this  great  result  be  brought 
about  ?  Shall  we  set  ourselves  upon  the  task  of  do- 
ing it  ?  Shall  we  try  to  brush  off  this  or  that  fleck 
that  has  fallen  upon  our  purity  ?  Shall  we  try  to 
curb  this  or  that  wrong  impulse,  and  to  bring  our 
desires  under  a  firm  restraint  ?  Shall  we  say  to  our 
souls  in  their  discouragement,  ''Come,  be  of  good 
cheer,"  or  in  their  consciousness  of  sin,  "Go,  and 
sin  no  more"  ?  Shall  we  attempt  by  study  to  re- 
gain our  faith,  or  by  self-indulgence  to  recover  our 
joyfulness?  Ah,  not  in  ways  like  these  shall  we 
conquer  back  that  deep  and  lasting  peace  which  has 
gone  from  us  and  which  we  long  to  have  restored. 

Shall  we  not  rather,  first  of  all,  admit  the  lesson 
of  our  own  experience  that  if  we  cannot  keep  our- 
selves steadfast  in  the  line  of  duty,  pure  from  the 
corruptions  that  are  in  the  world,  strong  in  the  faith 
which  once  we  had,  true  to  the  high  purposes  with 
which  we  set  out  in  life,  we  cannot  ourselves  regain 
these,  after  they  are  lost.  Shall  we  not  then  go  to 
God,  and  ask  Him  to  restore  us  ?  Shall  we  not 
seek  the  renewing,  illuminating,  strengthening  in- 
fluences of  His  Holy  Spirit,  to  do  the  work  which 
we  are  powerless  to  do  ?  Shall  we  not  realize  that 
all  our  trouble  comes  from  our  having  got  away 
from  Him,  and  so  make  it  our  chief  object  to  get 
back  to  Him  again,  and  to  come  under  His  inspira- 


80  Life  Indeed 

tions  ?  He  is,  He  loves  us,  He  has  a  plan  for  us, 
He  is  longing  to  restore  us — it  is  in  the  sense  of 
this  that  our  recovery  must  begin. 

And  how  shall  we  get  back  to  Him — how,  ex- 
cept through  Christ  in  whom  He  has  Himself  come 
near  to  us  ?  Ah,  when  we  realize  God's  being,  as 
Christ  has  revealed  it,  when  we  feel  His  love  as 
Christ  has  shown  it,  when  His  divine  light  comes 
in  Christ  and  takes  possession  of  our  souls,  that  is 
our  only  true  and  permanent  restoration.  It  is 
when  we  give  ourselves  to  Him  in  grateful  love  and 
consecrated  and  holy  service,  when  He  gives  Him- 
self to  us,  as  a  power  of  righteousness  formed 
within  us  and  mastering  us  more  and  more — it  is 
only  then  that  we  come  back  into  harmony  with 
God  and  with  ourselves.  For  then  it  is  no  longer 
we  who  live,  but  Christ  who  liveth  in  us.  His 
own  wonderful  words  are  then  fulfilled,  **  I  in  them 
and  Thou  in  me."  The  long  strife  is  ended,  and 
the  heavenly  peace  begun.  The  shadows  have 
broken  apart,  and  the  day  has  dawned.  The  fitful 
fever  of  our  spiritual  unrest  has  subsided ;  the 
soul's  pulses  move  with  a  strong  and  steady  beat, 
and  we  begin  to  grow  toward  the  sound  and  perfect 
manhood  of  those  who  walk,  not  after  the  flesh, 
but  after  the  spirit. 

O  Thou  great  Restorer  of  souls,  come  thus  into 
our  souls,  and  restore  them  to  purity  and  joy  and 
peace ! 


THE  WORK  OF  GOD 


Jesus  answered  and  said  unto  them,  This  is  the 
work  of  God,  that  ye  believe  on  Him  whom  He 
hath  sent. — John  vi.  29. 


THE  WORK  OF  GOD 

There  is,  then,  as  these  Jews  thought,  a  work  of 
God.  There  is  something  which  He  would  have 
us  do.  But  if  so,  we  want,  of  course,  to  know 
and  do  it.  It  is  certainly  our  duty,  and  it  will 
with  equal  certainty  prove  in  the  end  to  be  for  our 
advantage.  We  are  all  interested,  therefore,  in 
Jesus'  statement  of  it.  It  is  very  concise,  very 
simple  and  at  the  same  time  not  a  little  perplexing. 
"This  is  the  work  of  God,"  He  says,  "that  ye  be- 
lieve on  Me."  His  meaning  cannot  be  mistaken. 
It  is  not  merely  that  He  is  entitled  to  men's  confi- 
dence, nor  that  it  is  the  duty  of  all  men  to  give 
Him  their  confidence.  He  means  to  assert  that 
this  is  the  one  supreme  duty  of  all  men.  It  com- 
prehends all  other  duties.  It  is  the  work  of  God. 
And  to  believe  on  Him,  which  is  the  form  of  ex- 
pression that  He  uses  here,  as  He  used  it  on  many 
other  occasions,  denotes  the  strongest  possible  be- 
lief; it  signifies  an  absolute,  unhesitating,  unre- 
served reliance  upon  Him.  Not  merely  the  ac- 
knowledgment that  He  was  a  messenger  from  God  ; 
not  merely  the  acceptance  of  His  words  as  words  of 
unimpeachable  authority  and  truth  ;  not  merely  the 
confession  of  Him  as  the  rightful  Lord  of  thought 
83 


84  Life  Indeed 

and  life,  or  the  endeavor  to  obey  His  precepts  and 
to  copy  His  example ; — to  believe  on  Christ  means 
even  more  than  this.  It  is  fully  to  admit  His  ut- 
most claims  as  to  His  nature,  His  authority,  and 
His  mission  to  this  world.  It  is  to  render  Him  the 
homage  to  which  He  is  entitled  as  at  once  Son  of 
Man  and  Son  of  God.  It  is  to  yield  Him  the 
grateful  adoration  of  our  hearts.  It  is  to  trust 
with  unbounded  assurance  in  His  power,  His  wis- 
dom and  His  love.  It  is  to  give  ourselves  with 
cordial  self-surrender  to  His  service.  It  is  to  ex- 
pect by  His  grace  deliverance  from  sin  and  death, 
and  exaltation  by  and  by  to  His  right  hand.  To 
believe  on  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  is  something  more 
than  to  believe  Him  or  even  to  believe  in  Him.  It 
is  to  make  His  person  and  His  work  the  basis  of 
all  our  hopes,  the  object  of  all  our  affection,  the 
inspiration  of  all  our  activity. 

And  this  He  declares  to  be  the  work  of  God,  the 
one  great  and  comprehensive  duty  of  man.  If  He 
is  right,  it  is  your  first  duty  and  mine.  If  we 
neglect  it,  we  do  so  at  our  cost  and  at  our  peril.  If 
we  fail  in  it,  we  miss  the  true  end  and  glory  of  life. 
It  is  the  keystone  of  the  arch  of  moral  obligation. 
It  is  the  condition  on  which  alone  it  is  possible  for 
us  to  have  the  divine  favor  and  blessing.  On  our 
doing  this  one  thing,  or  not  doing  it,  depends  our 
destiny  here  and  hereafter. 

This  is  the  teaching  of  Jesus  Himself,  as  it  has 
been  in  later  days   the  teaching  of  ail  who  have 


The  Work  of  God  85 

faithfully  proclaimed  His  gospel.  And  yet,  simple 
as  it  is,  it  is  not  without  its  difficulty  for  many 
thoughtful  minds.  It  is,  no  doubt,  in  some  re- 
spects easier  to  believe  in  Him  to-day  than  when 
He  was  visibly  present  on  earth.  But  there  are 
some  of  us  for  whom  it  is  not  easy  to  admit  the 
claims  which  He  makes  upon  our  confidence ;  some 
who  say  that  they  cannot  believe  Him  to  have  been 
the  Son  of  God  sent  down  from  heaven.  And 
then  there  are  others  who  make  the  great  confession 
very  readily,  and  honestly,  and  heartily,  but  whose 
faith  makes  but  little  impression  on  their  characters 
and  lives.  Is  it  then  really,  we  are  tempted  to  ask, 
so  important  ?  Up  to  a  certain  point  it  is  not  diffi- 
cult to  believe  in  Jesus  Christ.  All  good  men  be- 
lieve in  Him  as  a  good  man.  All  minds  and  hearts 
that  are  sensitive  to  moral  beauty  pay  willing  hom- 
age to  His  nobility  of  character.  The  most  emi- 
nent name  in  history,  the  greatest  benefactor  of  the 
human  race,  the  world's  ideal  and  in  that  sense  the 
world's  Saviour,  we  can  readily  admit  Him  to  have 
been.  But  this  believing  on  Him,  in  the  sense  in 
which  He  seems  to  require  it  of  us,  this  unreserved 
acceptance  of  Him  as  the  Son  of  God,  this  unlim- 
ited confidence  in  Him,  this  entire  self-surrender  to 
Him, — is  it  necessary,  is  it  possible  ?  How  can  it 
be  the  first  and  greatest  of  all  duties  ?  What  right 
had  He  Himself  to  say  that  "  this  is  the  work  of 
God"? 

I  shall  try  to  answer  this  question  in  one  of  the 


86  Lite  Indeed 

many  ways  in  which  it  may  be  answered.  The 
common  answer  to  it  is  '  •  Beheve  on  the  Lord  Jesus 
Christ  and  thou  shalt  be  saved."  It  is  only  be- 
cause of  His  sacrifice  that  we  can  be  forgiven.  It 
is  only  by  His  Holy  Spirit,  received  into  our  hearts 
by  taith,  that  we  can  be  made  pure  and  strong,  be 
delivered  from  the  power  of  sin  and  fitted  for  the 
heavenly  blessedness.  And  that  is  true,  if  the 
word  of  God  is  true.  It  is  the  gospel  in  its  sim- 
plest terms. 

But  it  is  well  for  us  at  times  to  think  of  some  of 
the  things  which  are  implied  in  such  a  thorough- 
going faith  in  Jesus  Christ,  and  some  of  the  effects 
which  it  produces,  or,  in  other  words,  to  consider 
the  gospel  in  some  of  its  wider  relations,  and  to  ob- 
ser\-e  what  it  does  for  those  who  really  and  truly 
accept  it. 

To  believe  with  all  one's  heart  and  soul  in  Jesus 
Christ  means  then,  for  one  thing,  to  believe  that 
God  may  be  known  in  temis  of  humanity.  There 
are  those  who  tell  us  that  we  cannot  know  Him  at 
all.  If  there  is  anything  back  of  the  phenomena 
of  nature  besides  a  mysterious  energy,  we  cannot 
find  out  what  it  is.  and  our  minds  soon  become  be- 
wildered when  we  try  to  conceive  of  a  personal  be- 
ing who  is  eternal  and  infinite.  On  the  other  hand, 
the  j.X)pular  notion  of  God  is  merely  that  of  a  mag- 
nified man,  and  it  is  sometimes  said  that  man  is  a 
miniature  of  the  Almighty.  No  wonder  that  many 
reverent  minds  revolt  from  the  crude  idea  that  the 


The  Work  of  God  87 

Most  High  is  *'  altogether  such  an  one  "  as  even  the 
noblest  of  mankind,  and  take  refuge  in  agnosticism. 
But  if  the  measure  of  a  man  must  not  be  applied  to 
Him  whom  the  heavens  themselves  cannot  contain, 
there  is  still  a  likeness  between  His  nature  and  ours. 
And  the  proof  of  this  is  not  merely  that  Jesus  spoke 
of  Him  as  His  Father  and  our  Father,  or  that  He 
regarded  and  treated  all  men  as  God's  children. 
The  proof  is  that  God  could  and  did  become  incar- 
nate in  Him.  He  was  certainly  a  man,  bone  of 
our  bone  and  flesh  of  our  flesh  ;  and  another  nature 
did  not  come  and  dwell  in  Him,  side  by  side  with 
the  human  nature  which  was  so  evident  in  all  He 
said  and  did,  so  that  there  were  in  Him  two  per- 
sons, one  divine,  the  other  human.  God  simply 
poured  Himself  (if  I  may  say  so)  into  the  humanity 
of  Jesus  and  revealed  Himself  through  it.  He  was 
at  once  and  in  one  person  man  and  God.  Doubt- 
less in  order  that  this  might  be  possible,  some  of 
the  divine  attributes  were  laid  aside.  He  **  emptied 
Himself,"  as  St.  Paul  says,  *'when  He  took  the 
form  of  a  slave  and  was  made  in  the  likeness  of 
men."  The  fullness  of  the  Godhead  could  not  be 
brought  within  earthly  limitations.  "  My  Father," 
He  declared,  ''is  greater  than  I."  But  the  essen- 
tial nature  and  character  of  God  could  be  manifested 
in  a  human  character  and  life.  No  man  could  re- 
veal His  omnipotence,  or  His  omniscience,  or  His 
omnipresence.  But  even  a  man  might  manifest 
His  holiness,  His  justice  and  His  love.     And  Jesus 


88  Life  Indeed 

did  exhibit  these,  and  so  taught  us  how  we  are  to 
think  of  God.  He  that  hath  seen  Him  hath  seen 
the  Father.  And  we  have  seen  Him,  for  He  was 
made  flesh  and  dwelt  among  us  in  the  person  of  a 
man.  I  will  not  stop  to  speak  of  the  new  light 
which  is  shed  on  human  nature  by  a  fact  like  this. 
But  I  call  upon  you  to  consider  that,  while  God  is 
not  a  larger  man,  it  is  through  a  man  that  we  gain 
our  only  real  knowledge  of  Him.  He  is  not  un- 
knowable, for  we  have  beheld  His  glory  in  the  face 
of  Jesus  Christ. 

Then  the  second  thing  implied  in  a  true  belief  in 
Christ  is  the  belief  that  God  is  love.  For  that  is 
what  Christ  was.  It  was  in  love  tliat  He  came 
into  this  world.  It  was  in  love  that  He  gave  Him- 
self to  the  ministry  on  which  the  Father  had  sent 
Him.  It  was  in  love  that  He  sought  and  tried  to 
save  those  who  were  sunk  in  ignorance  and  sin.  It 
was  in  love  that  He  taught  and  toiled.  It  was  in 
the  fullness  of  His  love  that  He  died  upon  the  cross. 
A  more  loving  heart  than  that  of  the  Son  of  God 
has  never  been  known  on  earth.  He  loved  God. 
He  loved  truth.  He  loved  righteousness.  He 
loved  unlovely  and  sinful  men  and  women.  This 
was,  as  anybody  can  see,  the  chief  trait  of  His 
character.  This  was  the  impelling  motive  in  all 
His  activity.  It  is  what  made  Him  so  pitiful.  It 
is  what  made  Him  so  patient.  It  is  what  made 
Him  so  untiring  in  His  efforts  to  do  good.  It  is 
what  made  Him  so  self-forgetful  and  so  self-sacri- 


The  Work  of  God  89 

ficing.  Listen  to  Him  as  He  speaks,  on  the  hill- 
side, in  the  streets,  on  the  shore,  by  Jacob's  well, 
in  the  temple-courts,  in  the  upper  room.  Watch 
Him  as  He  sits  at  the  Pharisee's  table,  or  in  the 
home  at  Bethany ;  as  He  stands  by  the  bedside  of 
the  daughter  of  Jairus,  or  before  Lazarus'  grave ; 
as  He  moves  about  from  place  to  place,  teaching, 
comforting,  healing  the  sick,  raising  up  the  fallen ; 
as  He  kneels  in  the  garden,  stands  at  last  before 
Pilate,  expires  on  the  cross.  What  love  !  What 
boundless  love  !  Did  He  utter  burning  words  of 
indignation  in  regard  to  the  Scribes  and  Pharisees  ? 
It  was  because  of  His  love  for  those  whom  they  de- 
ceived and  oppressed.  Did  He  seize  a  whip  of 
small  cords  and  drive  the  tradesmen  from  the  tem- 
ple ?  It  was  because  of  His  love  for  God  whose 
worship  they  profaned.  Did  He  depict  in  language 
of  terrible  import  the  certain  consequences  of  sin  ? 
It  was  because  in  His  great  love  He  longed  to  save 
men  from  them.  Did  He  warn  those  who  heard 
Him  of  a  sin  that  hath  never  forgiveness  ?  It  was 
because  even  infinite  love  can  save  no  man  against 
His  will.  Surely  the  apostle  spoke  advisedly  when 
he  spoke  of  the  love  of  Christ  as  ''passing  knowl- 
edge." 

Well  then,  such  also  is  the  character  of  God. 
He  is  love;  not  power,  nor  justice,  nor  holiness, 
but  love.  So  He  also  feels  toward  the  children  of 
men — feels  toward  each  of  us  who  are  His  children. 
He  loves  us  just  as  Jesus  loved ;  too  well  to  let  us 


90  Life  Indeed 

sin  with  impunity ;  too  well  to  suffer  us  to  perish, 
if  it  is  possible  to  save  us ;  so  well  that  there  is 
nothing  which  He  will  not  do  for  us,  if  we  are  will- 
ing to  trust  and  love  and  obey  Him.  In  His  laws 
and  in  His  judgments  even,  we  can  hear  the  beat- 
ing of  His  heart  of  love.  And  in  all  our  trials 
and  sorrows  we  can  lay  our  heads  on  it  and  be  at 
rest. 

A  third  truth  which  is  implied  in  a  profound  be- 
lief in  Christ  is  that  of  the  supreme  importance  of 
character.  It  was  certainly  the  one  thing  for 
which  He  cared.  He  was  wholly  indifferent  to 
wealth  and  honor,  to  social  rank  and  public  ad- 
miration. He  had  a  tender  sympathy  for  physical 
suffering,  but  His  miracles  of  healing  seem  to  have 
been  chiefly  wrought  for  the  sake  of  the  moral  and 
spiritual  help  which  they  so  vividly  symbolized,  or 
for  which  they  opened  the  way.  Not  from  pain 
but  from  sin  did  He  long  to  save  men ;  not  from 
the  things  that  kill  the  body  but  from  those  that  de- 
stroy the  soul.  He  was  not  a  social  reformer,  as 
the  work  of  a  reformer  is  commonly  understood 
and  carried  on.  He  did  not  attack  the  social  cus- 
toms of  the  day,  or  seek  to  readjust  the  relations 
of  classes,  or  even  touch  in  His  discourses  on  the 
grave  political  issues  which  led  so  soon  afterward  to 
the  utter  destruction  of  the  Hebrew  nationality. 
His  teaching  all  bore  on  the  reformation  of  personal 
character.  He  strove  to  make  men  pure  and 
peaceable  and  forgiving  and  true  and  kind  and  lov- 


The  Work  of  God  91 

ing.  This  is  the  kingdom  of  heaven,  He  said,  that 
a  man  should  love  God  with  all  his  heart  and 
should  love  his  neighbor  as  himself.  And  He 
taught  this  by  His  example  as  well  as  by  His  ser- 
mons and  His  parables. 

Now  there  is  such  a  thing  as  a  belief  in  Christ 
which  makes  no  deep  mark  on  a  man's  own  per- 
sonal character  and  allows  him  to  remain  strangely 
indifferent  to  the  specific  duties  on  which  the  Mas- 
ter so  strongly  insisted.  But  it  is  not  such  a  faith 
as  that  of  which  I  am  now  speaking,  and  it  is  of 
very  little  practical  value.  A  real  belief  in  Him 
must  lead  any  one  of  us  to  set  the  matter  of  char- 
acter far  above  everything  else.  It  is  fatally  easy 
to  fancy  that  faith  in  Christ  may  be  a  substitute  for 
right  living  ;  that  one  may  be  mean  and  selfish  and 
dishonest  and  impure  and  almost  anything  else  that 
is  contemptible,  and  cover  it  all  from  the  sight  of 
God  and  men  by  membership  in  the  Church  or  by 
some  showy  form  of  religious  activity.  There  can 
be  no  doubt  as  to  the  way  in  which  Jesus  Himself 
would  treat  Christians  of  this  kind.  He  would  say 
to  them,  *'Woe  unto  you,  hypocrites!"  A  man 
simply  cannot  be  His  disciple  without  being  in  the 
first  place  absolutely  sincere,  and  without  feeling  to 
the  very  depths  of  his  soul  that  nothing  else  what- 
ever is  so  important,  so  beautiful,  so  worthy  of 
most  earnest  and  patient  pursuit,  as  a  character 
like  that  of  Christ  Himself,  strong,  pure,  free,  gen- 
erous, self-denying,  intent  on  doing  God's  will,  de- 


92  Life   Indeed 

voted  to  the  promotion  of  truth  and  righteousness 
and  happiness  among  men. 

The  latent  possibiUties  of  human  nature — that  is 
another  thing  which  every  man  must  beheve  in, 
who  truly  believes  in  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ.  He 
Himself  believed  in  men.  *'He  knew,"  as  John 
tells  us,  "  He  knew  what  is  in  man,"  the  evil  and 
the  good  alike,  and  yet  He  believed  in  man.  He 
believed  that  every  man  was  worth  saving,  that 
every  man  might  be  saved.  He  knew,  of  course, 
that  there  were  some  men  who  would  not  be  saved, 
but  it  was  because  they  would  not  receive  the  di- 
vine gift  that  was  offered  them.  He  saw  in  every 
human  being  the  nature  which  He  had  Himself  as- 
sumed, and  He  sought  to  win  all,  of  every  rank 
and  class  and  moral  condition,  for  the  kingdom  of 
heaven.  This  was  indeed  one  of  the  most  novel 
and  surprising  features  of  His  work — the  univer- 
sality of  the  invitation  which  He  Himself  uttered 
and  commissioned  His  aposdes  to  utter.  It  was, 
"  If  any  man  thirst,  let  him  come  unto  Me.  Come 
unto  Me  all  ye  that  labor  and  are  heavy  laden." 
And  He  declared  that  if  He  were  "lifted  up,  He 
would  draw  all  men  unto  Himself. ' '  This  spirit  of 
hope,  and  of  hope  even  for  the  least  and  lowest  of 
mankind,  was  absolutely  new  in  the  world.  Who 
was  this  young  Jew  that  He  should  conceive 
schemes  so  vast  and  think  that  even  publicans  and 
harlots  had  immortal  souls  ?  He  was  the  Son  of 
God.     He  knew  God  as  well  as  man.     And  He 


The  Work  of  God  93 

actually  lifted  on  His  faith  and  on  His  love  the  en- 
tire human  race  to  higher  destinies. 

He  taught  us  who  believe  in  Him  to  think  very 
poorly  of  ourselves  in  some  respects.  We  are  not 
what  we  ought  to  be,  nor  what  we  might  be.  But 
there  is  no  one  of  us  who  is  not  a  child  of  God 
and  (if  he  will)  an  heir  of  heaven.  Before  the 
most  insignificant  of  us  open  boundless  spheres  of 
growth  and  happiness  and  usefulness.  And  what 
is  true  of  us  is  no  less  true  of  the  very  meanest  and 
most  debased  of  our  fellow-men.  If  we  believe  in 
Christ,  that  is  what  we  believe  in  regard  to  our- 
selves and  every  member  of  the  race  to  which  we 
belong.  Nothing  so  precious  as  a  human  soul ! 
No  human  soul  beyond  the  reach  of  God's  love 
and  care,  or  of  His  renewing  and  sanctifying 
Spirit !  There  is  hope  for  all  mankind,  if  Christ 
was  right  in  His  estimate  of  men,  and  if  He  was 
Himself  what  we  believe  Him  to  have  been. 

I  ought  not  to  say  *'  If  He  was  what  we  believe 
Him  to  have  been."  I  should  rather  say,  if  He  is 
what  we  believe  Him  to  be.  For  He  is  the  same 
yesterday  and  to-day  and  forever,  the  same  on  the 
throne  of  glory  and  power  as  when  He  walked  the 
streets  of  Jerusalem  or  the  highways  of  Judea  and 
Galilee.  Nay,  He  has  never  left  this  world,  for 
whose  redemption  He  lived  and  died.  He  is  still 
present  in  it,  in  the  person  of  His  Holy  Spirit. 
He  is  present  in  every  assembly  of  His  followers. 
He  is  present  with  each  individual  soul  that  trusts 


94  Life  Indeed 

and  loves  and  tries  to  serve  Him.  He  is  present  in 
all  our  labors  and  struggles,  all  our  joys  and  sor- 
rows, present  with  us  wherever  we  may  be  called  to 
toil  for  Him,  present  with  us  whenever  and  wher- 
ever we  may  be  called  to  die.  "When  one  re- 
marked on  David  Livingstone's  loneliness  in  Africa, 
he  answered  that  he  was  not  alone.  '  Christ  said 
that  He  would  be  with  me  always.  It  is  the  word 
of  a  gentleman  of  the  strictest  honor,  and  there's  an 
end  of  it.'  When  he  fell  upon  his  knees  in  an 
African  hut  (says  Dr.  McKenzie),  and  threw  his 
arms  forward  on  the  couch,  and  rested  his  head 
upon  them,  he  believed  that  the  promise  was  kept. 
The  candle  burned  low  at  his  side,  and  his  heart 
ceased  to  beat,  but  he  knew  that  he  was  not  alone." 
He  who  was  with  His  servant  there,  is  with  His 
servants  everywhere.  And  He  is  guiding  them  in 
their  work,  and  making  it  successful.  If  it  were  not 
so,  they  might  well  shrink  from  many  of  the  tasks 
in  which  they  are  engaged.  He  sets  before  them 
open  doors.  He  sweeps  obstacles  out  of  their  way. 
He  rules  among  and  over  the  nations,  as  well  as 
over  and  in  His  Church,  so  that  '' nothing— abso- 
lutely nothing — comes  to  pass  either  in  heaven  or  on 
earth  without  His  divine  will."  We  do  not  believe 
in  a  dead  and  buried  Christ,  but  in  an  ever-living, 
ever-present  Saviour  and  King. 

And  therefore  we  believe  in  the  future  progress 
of  the  human  race.  We  believe  in  a  better  day 
that  is  coming.     We  believe  that  the  kingdom  of 


The  Work  of  God  95 

heaven  will  at  last  conquer  and  fill  the  world.  Not 
because  of  tendencies  which  we  observe  in  human 
nature,  nor  because  of  natural  forces  now  at  work 
in  society ;  but  because  it  was  to  redeem  and  save 
the  world  that  Christ  came  down  into  it  from 
heaven,  and  because  it  is  for  this  great  end  that  He 
is  working  still.  We  have  His  own  word  for  it. 
We  have  the  continual  evidence  of  His  gracious 
and  mighty  activity.  And  we  know  that  the  pur- 
pose of  God  in  the  incarnation,  the  crucifixion,  the 
resurrection  of  His  Son  cannot  be  changed  or  de- 
feated. We  are  optimists  and  enthusiasts — we  who 
believe  in  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ.  How  can  we 
help  it  ?  Can  it  be  for  a  moment  supposed  that 
His  redeeming  work  will  fail,  that  only  a  handful 
out  of  earth's  myriads  will  be  at  last  gathered  into 
the  kingdom  of  heaven,  and  that  He  who  is  infinite 
in  power  and  pity  will  be  satisfied  with  that  ?  No, 
the  time  must  come  when  all  men  shall  know  Him, 
and  worship  Him,  and  rejoice  in  Him,  and  the 
whole  earth  shall  be  full  of  His  praise. 

It  is  impossible  to  gather  into  a  few  paragraphs 
all  that  is  properly  included  in  a  hearty  and  intelli- 
gent belief  in  Christ.  But  let  me  enumerate  the 
few  points  that  I  have  now  touched  upon  :  It  means 
believing  that  there  is  a  natural  kinship  between 
man  and  God,  so  that  from  that  which  is  highest 
and  best  in  ourselves  we  know  something  at  least 
of  what  He  must  be.  It  means  believing  that  His 
nature  and  His  name  is  love.     It  means  believing 


96  Life  Indeed 

that  nothing  in  the  world  is  so  important  as  char- 
acter. It  means  beheving  in  the  divine  capacities 
that  are  latent  in  every  human  soul.  It  means  be- 
lieving that  the  Lord  of  all  power  and  grace  is  still 
alive,  and  is  still  working  in  and  for  the  world. 
And  it  means  believing  that  at  last  the  whole  round 
world  will  be  brought  to  His  feet.  It  is  a  grand 
creed — is  it  not? — uplifting,  inspiring,  enlarging 
the  mind,  rejoicing  the  heart.  But  it  is  what  I  be- 
lieve, and  what  you  believe,  if  we  really  believe  in 
the  Lord  Jesus  Christ. 

And  now  what  effect  must  such  a  faith  have  upon 
one  who  is  truly  possessed  by  it  ?  It  will  make 
him,  for  one  thing,  profoundly  reverent  toward 
God.  God  gains  nothing  from  distance  or  mystery. 
The  nearer  He  comes  to  us,  the  more  clearly  He 
makes  Himself  known  to  us,  the  more  glorious  does 
He  appear.  But  at  the  same  time,  beholding  His 
glory  as  we  do  in  the  face  of  Jesus  Christ,  we  know 
that  we  may  trust  Him  utterly.  Love  cannot  al- 
ways be  trusted,  unless  it  is  combined,  as  it  is  in 
tlim,  with  equal  wisdom,  righteousness  and  power. 
But  God's  love  may  be  trusted,  even  when  His 
dealings  with  us  are  most  mysterious.  It  cannot 
fail.  It  cannot  err.  It  will  have  its  way.  And 
then  any  one  who  has  even  begun  to  know  that 
love,  as  it  is  revealed  in  Jesus  Christ,  will  find  the 
first  of  the  two  great  commandments  easy  to  obey. 
He  cannot  help  loving  God  with  all  his  heart. 
Love  does  not  always  awaken  love,  but  dull  and 


The  Work  of  God  97 

hard  must  be  the  heart  which  can  beHeve  in  Jesus 
and  not  love  Him.  It  is  impossible.  Faith  and 
love  cannot  be  separated.  Faith  works  by  love,  as 
the  apostle  says,  and  in  its  eager  thankfulness  the 
loving  soul  pours  forth  its  praise  in  word  and  deed. 
It  finds  songs  even  in  the  night.  It  fills  the  dark- 
ness with  the  music  of  resignation  and  trust.  The 
light  of  heaven  shines  on  and  through  its  tears,  and 
grief  and  disappointment  cannot  rob  it  of  its  deep 
and  sacred  joy.  And  then  it  is  always  looking  for 
new  opportunities  of  service.  Do  you  believe  on 
the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  ?  Then  you  will  want  to  do 
something  for  Him,  You  will  have  a  strong  de- 
sire to  be  like  Him  in  character.  You  will  long  to 
have  other  people  far  and  near  know  Him  and  love 
Him  as  you  do.  If  you  only  half  believe  in  Him, 
you  may  not  feel  in  this  way.  You  may  think  that 
you  are  safe,  and  think  no  further  about  it.  This 
is,  alas  !  all  that  the  faith  of  some  people  amounts 
to.  A  mere  opinion,  a  mere  spasm  of  emotion  now 
and  then,  a  mere  confession  ''from  the  teeth  out- 
ward " — it  is  no  faith  at  all  !  A  real,  heartfelt  be- 
lief in  Christ  will  inevitably  have  the  effects  of 
which  I  have  been  speaking.  It  will  make  a  man 
over.  It  will  make  all  things  new  to  Him.  It  will 
give  him  new  views  of  God  and  man,  of  life  and 
death;  new  aims,  new  purposes,  new  desires  and 
hopes,  a  new  feeling  toward  his  fellow-men,  a  new 
spirit  and  temper  in  everything  he  does.  It  will 
make  him  love  and  seek  what  is  true  and  good,  and 


98  Life  Indeed 

hate  what  is  false  and  low  and  selfish.  I  say  a  gen- 
uine and  hearty  faith  in  Christ  cannot  but  have  this 
effect.  A  little  faith,  a  faith  that  merely  gives  him 
a  false  sense  of  security,  may  do  him  positive  harm. 
Such  a  faith  as  Christ  demands,  as  He  deserves, 
and  as  He  inspires  in  one  who  is  thoroughly  in 
earnest,  will  make  him  such  a  man  as  God  approves 
and  loves. 

And  this  is  why  Jesus  could  say  that  it  is  the 
work  of  God  that  we  should  believe  on  Him  ;  that 
it  is  what  God  would  have  us  do,  and  is  all  that 
He  requires  of  us.  It  leads  to  everything  else  that 
is  worth  being  and  doing.  It  is  simpler  perhaps, 
as  I  have  already  suggested,  to  say,  *<  Be  not  afraid, 
only  believe,  and  thou  shalt  be  saved."  But  we 
need  to  get  down  to  the  realities  which  underlie 
these  familiar  and  momentous  words.  And  this  is 
the  gospel  in  its  amazing  height  and  breadth  and 
its  magnificence  of  moral  power.  I  pray  you  re- 
ceive it  into  your  minds  and  hearts.  Let  it  mould 
and  sway  and  inspire  and  exalt  your  daily  lives. 
Believe  on  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  believe  on  Him 
as  you  believe  that  you  are  here  alive  to-day ! 
Nothing  else  is  so  true  as  His  words,  nothing  else 
so  noble  as  His  character,  nothing  else  so  certain 
as  that  He  is  the  Lord  of  the  world.  Other  things 
may  pass  away,  but  His  kingdom  cannot  fail.  A 
little  while  and  we  shall  have  vanished  from  the 
earth,  but  His  truth  shall  abide  unchangeable  for- 
ever.    There  is  no  other  name  so  great  as  His  in 


The  Work  of  God  99 

all  the  universe.  And  according  as  we  have  be- 
lieved, or  have  not  believed,  on  Him,  will  be  our 
endless  destiny.  O  my  dear  friends,  believe  in 
God,  believe  in  goodness,  believe  in  your  own  im- 
mortal souls,  believe  in  the  divine  love,  believe  in 
the  final  triumph  of  righteousness,  believe  in  the 
Lord  Jesus  Christ;  ''that  He  may  dwell  in  your 
hearts  by  faith,  and  that  ye  being  rooted  and 
grounded  in  love,  may  be  able  to  comprehend  with 
all  saints  what  is  the  length  and  breadth  and  depth 
and  height ;  and  to  know  the  love  of  Christ  which 
passeth  knowledge,  that  ye  may  be  filled  unto  all 
the  fullness  of  God." 


PUTTING  ON  CHRIST 


But  put  ye  on  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ. — Romans 
xiii.  14. 


VI 

PUTTING  ON  CHRIST 

A  PHRASE  SO  Striking  as  this  merits  attention, 
especially  as  it  is  twice  used  by  St.  Paul.  The 
figure  of  speech  embodied  in  it  is  many  times  em- 
ployed in  the  Scriptures :  it  was  a  favorite  one  with 
this  apostle,  and  it  is  not  infrequently  found  in  clas- 
sical writers.  We  recognize  its  appropriateness  and 
feel  its  poetical  beauty  when  Job  says,  for  example, 
*'I  put  on  righteousness  and  it  clothed  me,"  or 
when  Isaiah  sings,  "■  Awake,  awake,  put  on  strength, 
O  arm  of  the  Lord,"  or  when  Ezekiel  prophesies, 
*'  The  princes  of  the  sea  shall  come  down  from 
their  thrones,  and  lay  away  their  robes  and  put  off 
their  broidered  garments,  and  they  shall  clothe 
themselves  with  trembling."  So  the  promise  of 
our  Lord  to  His  disciples,  as  He  was  about  finally 
to  leave  them,  was  that  they  should  ''be  clothed 
with  power  from  on  high."  In  all  these  passages 
there  is  nothing  foreign  to  our  modern  modes  of 
expression.  Neither  is  there  anything  strange  in 
the  language  of  St.  Paul,  when  he  exhorts  the 
Roman  Christians,  in  view  of  the  fact  that  "the 
night  is  far  spent  and  the  day  is  at  hand,"  to  "  cast 
off  the  works  of  darkness  and  put  on  the  armor  of 
light  "  ;  or  the  Thessalonians  to  "  put  on  the  breast- 
103 


104  Life  Indeed 

plate  of  faith  and  love,  and  for  a  helmet  the  hope 
of  salvation";  or  the  Ephesians  to  ''put  on  the 
whole  armor  of  God."  It  is  interesting  to  ob- 
serve how  the  martial  life  of  the  cities  where  he 
wrote  affected  the  form  of  his  thought  and  sug- 
gested the  imagery  which  he  employed.  And  so 
again  when  he  urged  his  brethren  at  Colosse  to 
put  on  various  virtues,  such  as  a  heart  of  com- 
passion, kindness,  humility,  meekness,  long-suffer- 
ing, and  over  all  these,  like  a  large  outer  garment, 
to  put  on  love ;  or  when  he  says  to  the  Corinthians 
that  the  corruptible  body  must  put  on  incorruption 
and  the  mortal  must  put  on  immortality,  he  is  still 
speaking  as  we  ourselves  might  speak;  such  ex- 
pressions might  be  met  with  in  a  writer  of  the  pres- 
ent day.  But  we  begin  to  feel  the  strain  which  his 
thought  is  putting  upon  his  language,  to  feel  that 
he  is  crowding  into  words  more  meaning  almost 
than  they  can  hold,  when  we  hear  him  speaking  of 
the  human  spirit  as  ''clothed  upon  with  its  house 
which  is  from  heaven,"  or,  as  in  two  different 
epistles,  of  "putting  off  the  old  man,"  and  "put- 
ting on  the  new  man,"  as  if  one  could  change  his 
nature  as  he  changes  his  garments.  But  the  climax 
in  his  use  of  this  strong  metaphor  is  reached,  when 
summing  up  in  one  compact  phrase  all  that  he  would 
say,  as  if  it  were  impossible,  as  it  really  is,  to  ex- 
press his  whole  meaning  more  tersely,  clearly,  or 
forcibly,  he  says,  "  Put  on  Christ.  Clothe  your- 
selves anew  with  Him.     Let  your  souls  be  wrapped 


Putting  on  Christ  105 

up  in  Him,  as  in  a  garment.  Wear  Him  as  a 
celestial  panoply,  a  true  armor  of  light,  through 
the  battle  of  life.  It  is  not  enough  to  be  clad, 
like  God's  servant  of  old,  in  any  righteousness  of 
your  own.  It  is  not  enough  to  throw  around  you 
any  separate  graces  of  character.  There  is  only 
one  thing  to  strive  for,  only  one  thing  to  do ;  it  is 
to  put  on  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ." 

Such  language  as  this  is  not  unparalleled  in 
ancient  writers,  but  it  would  sound  strangely  if  we 
were  to  speak  thus  of  putting  on  Plato  or  Aristotle, 
Bacon  or  Stuart  Mill,  Emerson  or  Herbert  Spencer. 
And  if  the  expression  were  allowed  and  were  in- 
telligible, it  would  still  mean  much  less  than  St. 
Paul  means  when  he  speaks  of  putting  on  the  Son 
of  God.  I  want,  if  I  can,  to  lead  you  a  little  way 
into  his  meaning,  and  then  to  urge  you  to  do  the 
thing  which  he  enjoins. 

I  have  referred  to  two  passages  in  which  the 
apostle  uses  the  same  words,  but  he  does  not  use 
them  in  the  two  places  with  precisely  the  same  idea. 
The  other  one  is  in  the  Epistle  to  the  Galatians 
(iii.  27),  where  he  speaks  of  this  as  a  thing  already 
done.  "As  many  of  you,"  he  says,  ''as  were 
baptized  into  Christ,  did  put  on  Christ."  But 
here,  in  the  Romans,  he  speaks  of  it  as  something 
which  those  who  were  long  since  baptized  are  to  be 
all  the  time  engaged  in  doing.  Let  us  try,  first  of 
all,  to  get  hold  of  this  distinction. 

It  will  be  plain  enough  if  we  consider  for  a  mo- 


106  Life  Indeed 

ment  what  baptism  signified  to  those  to  whom  he 
was  writing.  It  was  the  rite  of  initiation  into  the 
new  society  which  Jesus  had  founded.  That  was, 
so  to  speak,  its  human  side.  But  it  had  also  a  far 
deeper  significance  than  this,  even  on  its  human 
side.  It  meant  that  those  who  received  it  began  a 
wholly  new  life.  They  ceased  to  be  heathens,  and 
they  became  Christians.  They  broke  free  from 
their  own  past,  as  well  as  separated  themselves  from 
the  society  around  them.  Of  course  they  aban- 
doned their  old  religious  beliefs  and  all  their  idola- 
trous forms  of  worship.  But  they  also  withdrew 
from  many  of  the  associations  in  which  they  had 
formerly  been  held.  All  their  views  of  things  were 
altered,  of  God  and  man,  of  life  and  death,  of 
pleasure  and  pain,  of  duty  and  destiny.  The  pro- 
found change  which  had  taken  place  in  their  intel- 
lectual convictions  brought  with  it  a  corresponding 
change  in  their  outward  lives.  They  came  out 
from  the  corrupt  society  in  which  they  had  been 
born,  and  formed  at  once  a  community  apart.  All 
things  literally  had  become  new  to  them ;  it  was  as 
if  they  had  entered  into  another  world.  How 
great  the  change  must  have  been,  may  readily  be 
seen,  if  you  will  think  what  it  means  for  a  Hindu 
in  India  or  a  Mussulman  in  Turkey  to  become  a 
Christian  in  our  day.  It  was  not  merely  a  change 
of  opinion  on  certain  subjects,  or  a  change  of  con- 
duct in  certain  particulars.  It  was  the  renunciation 
of  all  that  one  had  believed  and  loved  and  lived 


Putting  on  Christ  107 

for,  and  the  beginning  of  life  anew.  When  a 
Gentile  convert  went  down  into  the  water  of  bap- 
tism, it  was,  as  St.  Paul  says,  as  if  he  went  down 
into  his  grave,  and  he  rose  from  it  another  man. 
And  this  new  man  was  a  man  to  whom  Jesus  Christ 
was  everything. 

Thus  for  him  henceforward  Christ  was  the  source 
from  which  he  derived  his  knowledge  of  the  truth. 
When  an  ordinary  Greek  or  Roman  of  the  time  of 
St.  Paul  desired  to  know  the  truth  on  any  subject, 
outside  of  matters  of  daily  experience,  he  went,  if  he 
was  a  scholar,  to  the  philosophers ;  if  he  was  a 
plain  man  he  went  to  the  priests,  or  he  took  the 
current  popular  opinion,  or  he  gave  up  the  quest  in 
despair.  When  he  became  a  Christian,  he  went  to 
Christ  or  to  those  who  could  repeat  and  explain  to 
him  the  words  of  Christ.  His  only  question  was, 
*'What  has  Christ  said  about  this?"  and  every 
utterance  of  Christ  was  for  him  the  final  truth.  On 
His  promises  he  rested  with  an  absolute  confidence, 
and  he  received  every  declaration  that  had  come 
from  His  lips  as  being  the  very  word  of  God.  He 
put  his  mind,  as  it  were,  into  the  keeping  of  Christ, 
and  made  Him  Master  of  his  thought. 

And  so  of  his  conduct.  The  law  of  Christ  was 
his  supreme  law.  The  usage  of  the  day  justified 
many  things  which  Christ  had  forbidden.  No 
matter;  it  was  Christ  who  was  to  be  obeyed.  The 
law  of  the  state  forbade  certain  things  which 
Christ  had  commanded.     No  matter ;  he  would  go 


108  Life  Indeed 

to  the  dungeon  or  the  arena,  but  he  would  not  dis- 
obey Christ.  He  felt  that  he  belonged  to  Christ 
and  not  to  himself.  He  stood  in  the  lowly  rela- 
tion of  a  slave  to  One  whose  authority  over  him 
was  absolute  and  perfect.  His  supreme  purpose 
was  to  honor  and  serve  his  divine  Master,  and  he 
felt  that  nothing  could  ever  release  him  from  the 
obligation  to  live  and  to  die  for  Him.  The  very 
name  of  Christian  that  he  bore,  was  the  badge  of 
his  voluntary  and  honorable  servitude. 

And  then  when  he  became  a  follower  of  Christ, 
he  clothed  himself,  as  it  were,  not  only  with  his 
Master's  thought  and  will,  but  also  with  His 
righteousness.  What  righteousness  was  to  a  Jew, 
we  all  know.  It  was  to  keep  the  letter  of  the 
Mosaic  law.  To  a  Greek  or  a  Roman  it  was  to 
obey  his  own  conscience  as  well  as  he  could,  to  be 
not  less  virtuous  than  his  fellow-citizens  and  a  great 
deal  more  virtuous  than  his  gods.  The  whole  con- 
ception of  righteousness  was  changed  by  the  gos- 
pel, and  those  who  accepted  its  teachings  saw  at 
once  that  it  was  vain  for  them  to  hope  to  comm.end 
themselves  to  God  by  such  obedience  to  His  will  as 
they  were  able  to  render,  and  they  therefore  sought 
by  faith  to  cover  their  sins  with  the  perfect  righteous- 
ness of  Christ.  Over  their  polluted  souls  they 
sought  to  throw  that  spotless  mantle.  They  were 
taught  that  they  were  guilty  before  God,  and  could 
base  no  claim  to  His  acceptance  on  the  deeds  that 
they  had  done  or  tried  to  do.     But  they  put  on  the 


Putting  on  Christ  109 

righteousness  of  their  Master  and  Redeemer  as  a 
white,  unsullied  robe. 

This,  I  say,  was  the  relation  of  the  first  Christian 
believers — converts  from  heathenism,  most  of  them, 
whether  among  the  mountains  of  Galatia  or  in  the 
great  cities  of  the  Empire, — this  was  their  relation 
to  the  Lord  in  whom  they  trusted.  They  con- 
fessed it  when  they  were  baptized.  And  this  is 
what  St.  Paul  meant  when  he  wrote  to  them,  ''As 
many  of  you  as  were  baptized  into  Christ  did  then 
put  on  Christ."  "You  renounced  what  you  had 
formerly  believed  and  trusted  in  and  lived  for. 
You  died  to  the  ideas  and  practices  of  your  old 
heathen  life,  and  began  a  new  life  in  Christ.  You 
divested  yourselves  of  your  former  principles  and 
habits,  and  you  put  on,  instead  of  them,  the  mind, 
the  will,  the  righteousness  of  Christ." 

Now  this  is  not  precisely  true  of  us  in  this  age 
and  in  this  country.  No  such  complete  and 
striking  change  has  ever  taken  place  in  us,  simply 
because  we  are  not  converts  from  heathenism.  It 
may  have  taken  place  in  others  around  us  who 
were  brought  up  in  heathenism,  though  they  have 
always  lived  under  the  shadow  of  our  churches  and 
at  the  threshold  of  our  doors.  But  even  this  is 
hardly  possible,  because  Christianity  is  now  in  all 
the  air ;  it  is  in  the  very  blood  of  all  civilized  men. 
We  at  all  events  have  always  been  Christians,  and 
we  are  more  Christian  than  we  know  or  are  per- 
haps willing  to  admit.     ^lany  of  the  teachings  of 


110  Life  Indeed 

Christ  are  now  commonplaces  of  our  thought. 
Many  of  the  precepts  of  Christ  are  wrought  into  the 
laws  of  the  land  and  into  the  unwritten  laws  by 
which  all  society  is  governed.  In  this  sense  we 
have  never  put  on  Christ.  He  was  born  in  us 
when  we  were  born,  and  has  been  wrought  into  us, 
as  our  education  has  gone  forward.  Still  less  did 
any  such  radical  change  take  place  in  us  at  our 
baptism,  for,  unlike  the  believers  to  whom  St.  Paul 
wrote,  we  were  baptized  in  our  infancy,  and  the 
faith,  if  faith  there  was,  was  that  of  others,  not 
our  own. 

And  yet,  if  we  have  ever  confirmed  that  bap- 
tismal vow,  if  we  have  ever  taken  our  places 
among  Christ's  people  and  have  declared  ourselves 
His  followers,  we  have  done  precisely  that  which 
the  apostle  here  describes.  We  may  not  have  had 
as  much  to  put  off  as  the  earliest  Christians,  but 
we  have  had  just  as  much  to  put  on,  and  we  have 
put  it  on.  We  put  on  Christ  when  we  stood  be- 
fore men  and  confessed  that  Christ  was  our  Mas- 
ter. We  meant  that  He  was  then  and  thencefor- 
ward Master  of  our  thought.  We  did  not  profess 
that  we  would  stop  thinking  or  learning,  or  that  we 
would  accept  nothing  as  true  which  had  not  the 
stamp  of  His  authority  upon  it,  or  which  lay  out- 
side the  range  of  His  teaching.  But  we  meant  that 
we  would  receive  His  declarations,  on  every  sub- 
ject of  which  He  spoke,  as  to  the  character  and 
will  and  purposes  of  God,  as  to  His  own  nature 


Putting  on  Christ  111 

and  office,  as  to  the  nature  and  condition  and 
destiny  of  man,  his  need  of  forgiveness  and  of 
moral  renewal,  his  duty  of  repentance  and  faith 
and  self-surrender  to  God,  as  the  exact  and  eternal 
truth.  We  received  these  declarations,  whether  or 
not  we  could  fully  understand  them,  whether  or 
not  they  perfectly  accorded  with  our  accustomed 
opinions  or  with  the  opinions  of  other  men.  We 
surveyed  the  whole  realm  of  truth  and  each  par- 
ticular portion  of  it,  from  the  point  of  view  of  one 
to  whom  the  greatest  and  truest  of  all  truths  is  that 
of  the  incarnation  of  God  in  Christ.  This  is  what 
it  is  to  be  a  Christian  thinker,  and  this  is  what  we 
became,  when  we  became  followers  of  Christ. 

Then  we  accepted  also  the  yoke  of  His  authority 
as  the  Lord  of  our  conduct.  We  gave  ourselves 
up  to  His  service,  we  made  His  commandments 
the  law  of  our  living.  What  the  Galatians  did  in 
the  time  of  St.  Paul,  what  every  converted  heathen 
does  now,  in  receiving  the  sacrament  of  baptism, 
that  each  of  us  has  done  who  has  declared  himself 
to  be  a  Christian.  We  have  not  only  professed  our 
intention  to  comply  with  the  precepts  and  to  ex- 
hibit the  spirit  of  Christ,  as  these  have  become  ele- 
ments of  decorous  and  graceful  living.  As  much 
as  that  every  decent  man  must  do,  who  lives  in  a 
Christian  community.  But  there  has  been  the  def- 
inite surrender  of  our  personal  choice,  desire,  will, 
to  our  divine  Master,  and  the  cheerful  acceptance 
of  His  blessed  will  in  place  of  our  own.     We  put 


112  Life  Indeed 

off  our  selfish  ambition,  and  we  put  on  a  temper  of 
submission  to  Christ. 

And  then,  thirdly,  we  put  off  our  self-righteous- 
ness and  put  on  the  righteousness  of  Christ.  Not 
that  we  then  gave  up  the  endeavor  to  do  right.  O, 
far  from  that !  Then  it  was  that  we  first  began  to 
feel  such  a  desire  to  do  right  as  we  had  never  felt 
before,  to  hunger  and  thirst  after  a  righteousness 
such  as  we  had  not  yet  attained.  There  was 
awakened  within  us  a  deep,  strong  longing  to  be 
like  Christ,  to  be  worthy  of  Him,  to  be  fit  to  ap- 
pear in  His  presence.  But  then,  realizing  also  our 
sinfulness  and  weakness,  we  felt  that  we  could  be 
acceptable  in  the  sight  of  God,  only  as  the  mantle 
of  Christ's  perfect  righteousness  was  thrown  around 
us,  hiding  all  our  imperfections  and  our  sins.  We 
hoped  to  be  justified  (that  is  the  scriptural  word) 
not  because  of  what  we  do  or  what  we  are,  but  be- 
cause of  what  Christ  did,  and  because  of  what  He 
was  and  is.  By  a  simple  act  of  self-offering  faith 
we  hid  ourselves  as  it  were  in  Christ.  We  clothed 
our  shrinking,  sin-stained  souls  in  the  white  robe  of 
His  holiness. 

This  is  what  it  is  to  *<put  on  Christ,"  by  a  sin- 
gle, decisive,  voluntary  act.  And  it  is  well  for 
those  of  us  who  bear  His  name  and  who  hope 
in  His  grace,  to  consider  what  we  have  already 
done,  what  we  did,  many  of  us,  years  ago.  If  we 
have  to-day  any  hope  of  God's  mercy,  it  is  not  be- 
cause of  the  lives  we  are  living,  but  because  we 


Putting  on  Christ  113 

have  put  on  the  righteousness  of  Christ.  Let  us 
feel,  then,  our  utter  unworthiness,  and  empty  our 
hearts  of  all  foolish  pride,  while  we  realize  and 
confess  our  entire  dependence  upon  the  grace  that 
is  in  Christ  Jesus.  And  then  let  us  remember  that 
we  are  committed  to  His  service.  We  have  pledged 
ourselves  to  obey  Him.  We  have  accepted  Him 
as  our  Master.  The  world  has  no  authority  over 
us ;  to  Him  alone  we  stand  or  fall,  and  He  is  able 
to  make  us  stand.  O  let  us  not  forget  that  the 
yoke  of  Christ,  when  once  put  on,  can  never  be 
put  off,  and  that  each  of  us,  who  have  accepted  the 
rule  of  Christ,  owes  to  Him  the  same  patient,  un- 
wearied, complete  devotion,  which  the  slave  owes 
to  his  master,  which  the  subject  owes  to  his  king. 
And,  thirdly,  what  right  have  we  who  are  Chris- 
tians, to  suffer  our  minds  to  be  disturbed  on  any 
subject  on  which  we  have  the  authority  of  Christ  ? 
How  shall  we  doubt  or  deny,  when  He  has  spoken  ? 
How  shall  we  dispute  His  word  ?  How  shall  we 
distrust  His  promises  ?  Heaven  and  earth  may  pass 
away,  but  no  word  of  His  can  ever  pass.  It  is  not 
for  me  to  urge  those  of  you  who  are  already  His 
followers,  in  this  sense  of  the  words,  to  '^put  on 
the  Lord  Jesus  Christ."  But  I  exhort  you  to  re- 
member that  you  have  long  ago  done  so,  and  to 
keep  ever  in  mind,  and  to  make  your  thought  and 
conduct  accord  with,  this  close  and  beautiful 
relation  of  dependence  and  of  service,  that  He 
may  be  to  you  what  He  was  to  His  first  disciples, 


114  Life  Indeed 

all  in  all — the  beginning  and  the  end  of  your  re- 
ligion. 

But  there  are  some  of  you,  probably,  who  do  not 
stand  in  this  relation.  You  are  to  some  extent 
Christians.  Yes ;  I  presume  there  are  no  heathen 
here.  But  you  are  Christians  because  you  cannot 
help  it,  because  you  were  born  in  this  country  and 
in  this  age  of  the  world.  Or  you  are  Christians 
because  it  is  the  decent  and  proper  thing  to  obey 
some  of  Christ's  commandments,  and  to  show  some- 
thing of  His  spirit.  But  you  are  not  Christians  in 
the  true  sense  of  the  word,  till  you  have  done  what 
I  have  now  been  describing, — till  you  have  "  put 
on  Christ."  And  till  then  you  not  only  have  no 
right  to  hope  for  the  favor  of  Christ  in  the  life  to 
come,  you  have  not  even  begun  to  know  the  joy 
and  glory  of  life  on  earth.  You  are  all  adrift  on  an 
ocean  of  uncertainty,  if  you  do  not  accept  Him  as 
a  divine  teacher.  You  are  at  the  mercy  of  your 
own  ignorance  and  of  your  own  passions,  if  you  do 
not  let  Him  rule  your  conduct.  And  O,  how  will 
you  dare  to  appear  before  the  all -seeing  eye  of  God, 
if  your  frailties  and  your  sins  are  not  covered  up 
by  something  better  than  such  a  righteousness  as 
yours  ?  Do  not  tell  me  that,  so  far  as  you  can  see, 
many  of  those  who  call  themselves  Christians  have 
not  put  on  Christ  to  any  very  great  degree.  I 
know  it ;  I  know  it.  It  is  the  scandal  and  the 
shame  of  Christendom.  But  after  all,  the  truest, 
noblest,  happiest  life  is  a  life  in  Christ.     And  there 


Putting  on  Christ  115 

is  no  other  sure  foundation  for  the  hope  of  blessed- 
ness hereafter  than  that  which  is  laid  in  Him. 
This  is  no  longer  a  proposition  to  be  proved.  It  is 
the  declaration  of  the  word  of  God.  It  is  the  testi- 
mony of  an  illustrious  and  increasing  company, 
from  the  days  of  the  apostles  to  our  own.  And 
this — and  nothing  else — is  what  it  is  to  become  a 
real  Christian.  It  is  to  make  the  mind  and  will 
and  righteousness  of  Christ  your  own.  It  is  to 
clothe  yourself  with  Christ.  One  simple  act  of 
self-surrender,  and  it  is  done  ! 

But  if  this  is  so,  why  did  St.  Paul  write  to  the 
Roman  Christians,  exhorting  them  still  to  put  on 
Christ  ?  Had  they  not  been  baptized  into  Him  like 
the  Galatians  ?  Or  had  they  so  fallen  away  that 
they  needed  to  be  converted  over  again  ?  Ah  ! 
but  we  have  not  yet  got  at  the  full  meaning  of  this 
deep  phrase.  There  still  remained  for  them,  and 
there  still  remains  for  us,  the  long,  hard,  necessary 
task  of  putting  on  the  character  of  Christ.  And 
that  is  what  St.  Paul  refers  to  in  the  text.  Without 
it  everything  may  be  begun,  but  nothing  is  finished. 
The  foundation  is  laid.  Now  let  the  perfect  build- 
ing rise  upon  it ! 

And  this,  my  Christian  friends,  is  the  one  thing 
that  we  have  to  do, — to  put  on  the  character  of 
Christ.  A  man  may  go  and  live  for  many  years  in 
a  foreign  country.  He  may  engage  in  business 
there,  may  learn  its  language,  submit  to  its  laws, 
and  adopt  many  of  its  customs ;  he  may  even  be- 


116  Life  Indeed 

come  a  citizen  of  it,  and  earn  a  right  to  its  pro- 
tection. And  yet  he  may  never  enter  at  all  into 
the  real  life  of  its  people,  may  take  no  true  interest 
in  its  prosperity,  may  cherish  toward  it  no  genuine 
loyalty,  but  remain  to  the  end  as  much  a  foreigner 
as  he  was  at  the  beginning.  Or  one  may  be  a 
member  of  a  Christian  church,  he  may  attend  its 
services  and  behave  with  entire  propriety,  may  suf- 
fer his  name  to  stand  on  its  roll,  may  make  his 
little  contribution  when  the  plate  is  passed,  and 
pay  his  pew-rent  with  prompt  regularity.  But  he 
may  still  have,  and  may  even  desire  to  have,  no 
share  in  the  real  life  of  the  Church ;  its  spirit  is 
not  in  him,  he  takes  no  part  in  its  work,  and  its 
services  perhaps  do  him  about  as  much  good  as 
they  do  to  the  rafters  of  its  roof  or  to  the  carpet 
on  its  floor.  And  so  a  man  may  be  a  Christian — 
yes,  we  cannot  deny  it,  he  may  be  a  genuine 
Christian;  he  may  have  put  on  the  Lord  Jesus 
Christ  in  the  sense  thus  far  explained,  and  to  such 
an  extent  as  to  cherish  a  comfortable  hope  of  his 
final  salvation,  who  has  caught  very  little  of  the 
spirit  of  Christ,  and  exhibits  a  character  very  dif- 
ferent from  that  of  his  Master.  The  world  does 
not  want  such  Christians  as  these.  They  are 
simple  obstacles  in  the  way  of  Christianity.  And 
such  Christians  we  do  not  want  to  be.  We  want 
with  the  faith  of  Christ  to  put  on  the  character  of 
Christ.  His  purity,  for  example.  His  utter  and 
absolute   aversion   to  evil.     We  do  not  want   the 


Putting  on  Christ  117 

spirit  which  says,  ''Pardon  thy  servant  in  this 
thing,"  or  that  thing,  or  which  does  the  thing  and 
asks  no  pardon,  because  it  deems  Christ's  standard 
of  morahty  too  high.  We  want  a  character  that 
will  not  tamper  with  evil,  but  will  fearlessly  do 
right  at  whatever  cost.  Then  the  gentleness  of 
Christ.  His  purity  was  not  of  that  kind  which 
makes  a  man  hard  in  his  judgments,  and  repels 
those  whom  it  ought  to  attract.  '*  Separate  from 
sinners,"  and  yet  the  best  friend  that  sinners  ever 
had,  always  working  for  them,  always  winning 
them  to  Him,  always  doing  them  good — that  is 
what  He  was,  and  that  is  what  we  ought  to  be. 
The  constant  sense  of  spiritual  things  was  another 
trait  of  His  character  which  we  too  should  strive 
to  put  on.  The  world  around  Him  was  not  so 
bright  as  it  is  around  us,  but  no  earthly  splendor 
could  have  blinded  His  eyes  to  the  heavenly  vision 
which  was  before  Him  all  the  time.  And  what  we 
need,  beyond  almost  anything  else,  is  to  realize  the 
nearness  to  us  of  the  unseen  realms,  so  that  in- 
fluences from  them  may  govern  our  lives,  and  that 
the  truth  which  relates  to  them  may  be  to  us  both 
motive  and  consolation.  The  self-denying  love  of 
Christ  for  men, — if  we  have  not  something  of  it, 
we  are  not  worthy  of  Him.  If  we  are  not  willing 
to  sacrifice  anything  of  our  wealth,  our  comfort,  our 
present  advantage,  for  the  sake  of  those  whom  He 
died  to  save,  how  can  we  call  ourselves  His  dis- 
ciples ?     Surely  we  need   to  put  on  more  of  this. 


118  Life  Indeed 

We  need  to  show  it  in  our  daily  life,  in  our  homes, 
in  our  business,  in  our  relations  to  the  Church  of 
God,  if  we  are  to  make  on  our  fellow-men  any- 
thing like  the  same  impression  of  character,  which 
was  made  by  the  Lord  whose  example  we  profess  to 
be  copying.  And  so  of  His  meekness.  His  patient 
forbearance,  His  pity  for  every  form  of  suffering, 
His  perfect  sincerity.  His  utter  indifference  to  hu- 
man applause  as  compared  with  the  favor  of  His 
Father  in  heaven.  I  cannot  enumerate  all  the 
traits  of  His  character,  but  there  is  not  one  of 
them  which  one  who  desires  to  be  truly  His  fol- 
lower will  not  strive  to  put  on.  And  yet,  after  all, 
what  we  need  to  do  is  not  to  seek  to  adorn  our- 
selves with  these  separate  graces,  as  one  might  tie  a 
handful  of  roses  to  a  dead  stem.  The  true  way  is 
to  put  on,  not  the  characteristics  of  Christ,  but 
Christ  Himself;  to  get  His  real  spirit  into  our 
souls,  and  then  these  several  graces  will  soon  make 
themselves  manifest,  as  a  tree  which  is  truly  alive 
will  burst  of  itself  into  a  perfect  dome  of  bloom, 
when  it  is  touched  by  the  summer  sun. 

And  this  is  Christianity,  its  secret,  its  power,  its 
divine,  undying  beauty.  It  is  Christ,  first,  last, 
and  midst,  and  without  end.  And  it  is  Christ  not 
only  on  the  page  of  the  world's  history,  not  only 
on  the  artist's  glowing  canvas,  not  only  exalted  to 
the  right  hand  of  God,  but  Christ  incarnate  again 
in  every  Christian.  It  is  the  hiding  of  human  in- 
firmities and  passions,  not  only  from  the  eye  of 


Putting  on  Christ  110 

God  by  the  cloak  of  Christ's  righteousness,  but 
even  from  the  eyes  of  men  by  the  radiant  garment 
of  His  character.  Just  as  fast  and  as  far  as  men 
put  on  the  character  of  Christ,  just  so  fast  and  so 
far  will  Christianity  move  onward  irresistibly. 
That  which  hinders  it  now  is  simply  that  those  who 
represent  Him  in  the  world  are  so  unlike  Him,  that 
you  and  I,  among  others,  who  owe  to  Him  what 
we  most  highly  prize,  who  look  to  Him  for  what 
we  most  ardently  desire,  have  so  little  of  His 
spirit  and  are  so  contented  to  remain  the  poor,  im- 
perfect Christians  that  we  are.  O,  let  us  awake, 
arise,  and  put  on,  more  and  more,  the  Lord  Jesus 
Christ ! 

Then  two  things  will  happen.  In  the  first  place, 
those  around  us  will  feel  the  power  of  His  religion 
as  they  have  never  yet  felt  it.  It  is  not  by  sermons 
that  the  world  is  to  be  saved  ;  sermons  enough 
have  been  preached  to  save  it  twice  over  ;  nor  by 
the  printed  Bible,  translated  into  every  language 
of  the  globe ;  nor  merely  by  the  silent,  mysterious 
influence  of  the  Holy  Spirit.  It  is  by  the  pure, 
earnest,  unworldly,  self-sacrificing  lives  of  men 
and  women,  who  have  not  only  put  on  Christ,  but 
in  whom  as  a  living  energy  He  dwells.  If  that 
were  true  of  His  people  anywhere,  the  whole 
community  around  them  would  be  stirred,  as  we 
are  told  that  the  city  of  Capernaum  was  moved  at 
the  coming  of  the  Lord  Himself. 

And  finally,  for  them  at  least  heaven  would  al- 


120  Life  Indeed 

ready  have  begun.  For  this  is  heaven — to  be  like 
Him.  Not  golden  streets  and  crystal  seas  and  sap- 
phire walls  and  gates  of  pearl !  It  does  not  mat- 
ter where  we  are ;  everything  turns  on  what  we 
are.  If  we  are  of  the  earth,  earthy,  then  there 
can  be  no  heaven  for  us.  But  if  we  bear  the 
heavenly  image,  then  heaven  is  around  us  and 
within  us  now.  "  Beloved,  now  are  we  the  sons  of 
God,  and  it  doth  not  yet  appear  what  we  shall  be 
hereafter.  But  we  know  that  when  He  shall  ap- 
pear, we  shall  be  like  Him."  We  know  that,  and 
to  know  that  is  enough.  It  is  to  have  the  assur- 
ance of  eternal  life. 


THE  PRACTICAL  MAN'S  MISTAKES 


Where  there  is  no  vision,  the  people  perish. 
Prov.  xxix.  1 8. 


VII 

THE  PRACTICAL  MAN'S  MISTAKES 

There  is  a  man  whom  everybody  knows,  and 
whom  many  people  admire,  though  I  am  persuaded 
that  he  commonly  receives  more  respect  than  he 
deserves.  He  has  been  a  pew-holder  in  many  dif- 
ferent churches.  He  has  however  attended  them 
rather  from  the  force  of  habit,  or  because  he  has 
thought  it  to  be  for  his  social  advantage,  than  be- 
cause he  has  any  particular  sympathy  with  the 
preaching,  or  much  respect  for  the  work  in  which 
the  Church  is  chiefly  engaged.  He  is  a  familiar 
figure  in  Wall  Street,  and  is  noted  for  his  keenness 
and  shrewdness,  his  energy  and  industry.  He  has 
great  confidence  in  himself,  and  is  commonly  suc- 
cessful in  his  commercial  schemes.  He  is  very 
careful  to  keep  all  sentiment  out  of  his  business, 
and  sometimes  seems  harsh  and  even  cruel  toward 
those  with  whom  he  deals.  But  it  is  considered 
safe  to  trust  his  judgment,  and  he  is  seldom  de- 
ceived through  an  over-confidence  in  other  men. 
He  is  a  member  of  various  boards  of  administra- 
tion, and  his  influence  in  these  is  not  friendly  to 
large  undertakings,  but  commonly  favors  a  cautious, 
economical,  and  conservative  policy.  He  is  inter- 
ested in  politics,  local  and  national,  and  here  he 
123 


124  Life  Indeed 

invariably  votes  with  his  party.  He  is  a  firm  be- 
liever in  the  regular  organization,  and  approves, 
upon  the  whole,  of  the  methods  by  which  partisan 
success  is  secured.  He  is  not,  indeed,  blind  to 
certain  abuses  and  evils  connected  with  these,  but 
he  regards  them  as  inevitable,  and  he  says  that  as 
men  are  actually  constituted,  a  high  degree  of  po- 
litical morality  is  an  illusive  dream. 

I  say  that  everybody  knows  this  man.  For  I  am 
not  speaking  of  an  individual,  I  am  speaking  of  a 
type.  The  figure  which  I  wish  to  set  before  your 
eyes  is  that  of  the  so-called  ''  practical  man."  He 
is  the  man  who  prides  himself  on  his  freedom  from 
illusions.  He  sees  things  as  they  are.  He  has 
been  trained  in  the  school  of  experience.  He  has 
a  clear  and  exact  knowledge  of  other  men.  He 
understands  the  conditions  under  which  the  work 
of  the  world  is  carried  on.  He  has  a  very  definite 
notion  as  to  that  which  is  possible,  and  that  which 
it  is  absurd  to  attempt.  He  has  measured  the  mo- 
tives by  which  men  are  governed,  and  discerned 
the  objects  on  which  their  hearts  are  really  set.  He 
is  therefore  never  carried  away  by  enthusiasm. 
Nothing  can  tempt  him  to  engage  in  a  quixotic  en- 
terprise. The  rule  of  his  life  is  that  only  those 
ends  are  worth  seeking  which  one  has  good  reason 
to  believe  that  he  can  finally  attain.  He  holds 
that  in  everything  a  prudent  man  will  observe  a 
just  proportion  between  his  efforts  and  his  aims. 

There  is  no  one  for  whom  the  practical  man  has 


The  Practical  Man's  Mistakes     125 

a  greater  contempt  than  for  the  idealist  or  the  vi- 
sionary ;  and  he  makes  no  distinction  between  the 
two.  There  is,  however,  a  very  important  distinc- 
tion between  them.  The  visionary  is  the  man  who 
is  aiming  at  things  that  are  obviously  impracticable, 
like  building  a  bridge  across  the  ocean  or  a  railway 
to  the  moon ;  his  schemes  are  idle  and  fanciful ; 
his  brain  is  unbalanced,  so  that  he  mistakes  dreams 
for  realities,  and  in  his  fantastic  and  illogical  con- 
duct shows  that  he  lacks  common  sense.  Such  a 
man  is  to  be  pitied  rather  than  despised,  but  no  in- 
telligent person  can  either  trust  or  greatly  respect 
him. 

The  idealist,  on  the  other  hand,  is  distinguished 
from  the  so-called  practical  man,  not  so  much  by 
the  methods  that  he  adopts  as  by  the  ends  that  he 
aims  at.  And  these,  again,  are  different,  not  so 
much  in  kind  as  in  degree.  They  are  those  ob- 
jects of  pursuit  which  are  highest  and  best.  He 
does  not  ask  what  is  expedient,  but  what  is  right ; 
not  what  is  agreeable,  but  what  is  true.  His  desire 
is  to  know  the  truth,  and  to  act  in  conformity 
with  it.  His  endeavor  is  to  do  right,  and  to  make 
other  people  do  right.  And  his  standard  of  that 
which  is  right  and  true  is  not  the  prevailing  senti- 
ment of  the  day,  but  the  judgment  of  an  enlight- 
ened conscience,  a  clear  understanding,  a  lofty  and 
pure  imagination.  He  is  not  satisfied  for  himself 
to  aim  at  anything  lower  than  absolute  righteous- 
ness and  truth ;    and  so  far  as  his  relations  with 


126  Life  Indeed 

other  men  are  concerned,  he  would  bring  them  and 
hold  them  to  the  same  standard.  This  is  the 
idealist,  and  you  see  at  once  how  widely  he  differs 
in  his  way  of  looking  at  things  from  the  practical 
man.  And  the  practical  man  has  a  supreme  con- 
tempt for  him. 

This  is  one  reason  at  least  why  he  has  so  little 
respect  for  the  Church.  It  is  composed  of  ideal- 
ists. The  worst  of  these  are  its  ministers.  Utterly 
ignorant  of  actual  life,  with  a  purely  scholastic  con- 
ception of  human  nature,  living  in  retirement  from 
the  arena  on  which  other  men  are  struggling,  and 
having  no  faintest  conception  of  the  temptations  to 
which  they  are  exposed  and  the  real  motives  by 
which  they  are  governed,  the  minister  of  the  gospel 
is  engaged  in  presenting  ideals  of  character  which 
he  himself  does  not  attain,  and  which  nobody  else 
can  hope  to  attain  in  this  life.  His  judgment  in 
practical  matters  is  worth  nothing,  and  no  intelli- 
gent man  will  pay  much  attention  to  anything  he 
says.  It  is  quite  true,  of  course,  that  he  gets  these 
ideals  and  principles  and  standards  of  character 
out  of  the  Bible,  but  the  Bible  is  an  ideal  book, 
and  the  practical  man  has  little  use  for  it.  It  is  a 
curious  product  of  the  ancient  and  oriental  mind, 
but  it  is  not  adapted  to  the  present  day.  The  sys- 
tem of  religion  contained  in  it  has  an  evident  charm 
for  dreamy  and  poetic  natures,  and  its  doctrines 
and  principles  might  do  very  well  in  an  ideal 
world ;  but  in  the  actual  condition  of  human  so- 


The  Practical  Man's  Mistakes    127 

ciety,  the  morality  enjoined  in  the  Bible  is  wholly 
impracticable ;  and  the  representations  found  in 
the  New  Testament  of  things  beyond  our  sight  and 
reach  are  too  indefinite  and  uncertain  to  occupy  the 
attention  of  a  man  who  is  governed  by  reason  and 
who  sees  things  as  they  are. 

Then  the  work  which  the  Church  has  undertaken 
to  do  is  partly  unnecessary  and  partly  preposterous. 
What  more  visionary  enterprise,  for  example,  have 
men  ever  engaged  in  than  that  of  foreign  missions 
— the  attempt  to  convert  the  whole  world  to  Chris- 
tianity !  One  might  as  well  try  to  transform  all  the 
trees  of  the  forest  into  cedars  or  palms.  If  the 
Church  were  concerned  with  that  which  is  practi- 
cal, it  would  confine  its  attention  to  the  heathen  at 
home.  And  yet  what  it  has  attempted  to  do  for 
these  is  not  what  they  really  need.  It  is  trying  to 
make  converts  of  them,  to  get  their  names  upon  its 
rolls,  and  lead  them  to  declare  themselves  Chris- 
tians. What  it  ought  to  be  doing  is  to  improve  the 
sanitary  and  social  conditions  under  which  they 
are  living,  to  relieve  their  poverty  and  distress,  to 
provide  them  with  proper  food  and  clothing,  and 
set  them  in  the  way  of  greater  physical  comfort ; 
and  their  spiritual  welfare  can  be  taken  in  hand  by 
and  by. 

And  if  the  practical  man  does  not  approve  of  the 
work  which  the  Church  is  trying  to  do,  he  has  also 
very  little  respect  for  the  thorough  sincerity  of 
those  who  compose  the  Church.     They  are  indeed 


128  Life  Indeed 

idealists  in  theory,  but  in  point  of  fact,  he  says,  they 
are  just  like  other  people.  These  extravagant 
notions,  these  lofty  standards  and  aims, — they  do 
not  carry  them  into  their  business,  and  for  the  very 
good  reason  that  all  business  is  impossible  on  any 
such  basis.  "And  you  know  it,"  he  says,  "you 
who  call  yourselves  Christians  !  You  know  that  a 
man  cannot  be  honest  and  true,  in  the  ideal  sense 
of  those  words,  and  be  successful  in  mercantile 
life  at  the  present  day.  You  are  therefore  simply 
adding  hypocrisy  to  your  other  failures  and  sins. 
You  might  far  better  lay  aside  such  extravagant 
pretensions,  and  let  your  religion,  like  mine,  con- 
sist in  doing  about  right,  in  doing  as  well  as  you 
can,  in  view  of  the  conditions  in  which  you  are 
placed." 

So,  too,  as  to  politics.  Nothing  is  more  absurd 
than  the  notion  that  the  political  life  of  this  city  or 
country,  at  the  present  day,  can  be  raised  to  an 
ideal  level.  You  have  to  take  men  as  you  find 
them  and  do  the  best  you  can  with  them.  You 
must  have  an  elaborate  organization,  or  everything 
will  be  in  confusion.  And  such  an  organization 
must  deal  with  men  as  they  are.  If  you  want 
votes,  you  must  pay  for  them,  either  in  bank-bills 
or  in  offices.  A  great  deal  of  hard  and  disagreeable 
work  must  be  done,  and  done  by  those  who  are  not 
influenced  by  patriotic  and  unselfish  motives.  Many 
of  the  most  useful  men  of  the  party  are  men  who 
are  morally  corrupt.     But  their  services  cannot  on 


The  Practical  Man's  Mistakes    129 

this  account  be  dispensed  with.  And  they  are 
really  no  worse  than  multitudes  of  those  who  com- 
pose the  community  itself.  The  idea  of  an  admin- 
istration in  which  the  public  offices  shall  be  held  by 
men  who  administer  them  only  for  the  public  good, 
is  the  dream  of  an  idle  idealism.  We  want  prac- 
tical methods  which  will  give  us  practical  results. 

I  cannot  undertake  to  exhibit  in  detail  the  work- 
ing of  such  a  man's  mind,  but  I  am  sure  that  you 
will  recognize  from  this  rapid  sketch  a  type  of  char- 
acter very  common  among  us.  There  have  always 
been  such  men.  They  are  the  natural  product  of  a 
keen,  commercial,  and  competitive  age.  They 
command  a  certain  amount  of  admiration.  They 
exert  a  wide  and  deplorable  influence.  For,  after 
all,  ideals  exist.  They  are  natural  to  all  of  us. 
They  commonly  have,  in  our  earlier  years,  great 
vividness  and  beauty.  They  exercise  a  command- 
ing power  over  us  until  they  are  shattered,  or  until 
we  voluntarily  abandon  them.  And  in  consider- 
ing the  contrast  between  one  who  is  inspired  and 
governed  by  them  and  one  who  is  not,  it  is  worth 
while  for  us  to  observe  two  or  three  serious  mistakes 
which  are  made  by  the  practical  man. 

The  first  is  that  of  underestimating  human  nature. 
Men  are  sordid,  indeed,  and  selfish  and  cunning, 
often  treacherous  and  often  false.  But  the  earth 
would  long  since  have  become  a  mere  den  of  wild 
beasts,  if  it  were  not  for  the  nobler  impulses  which 
are  also  natural  to  them.     If  you  judge  them  by 


130  Life   Indeed 

what  you  see  of  them  in  the  daily  intercourse  of 
life,  you  are  apt  to  form  a  very  poor  opinion  of 
them,  especially  if  their  narrowness,  their  greed,  or 
their  obstinacy  baffles  you  in  your  plans.  It  is 
impossible  to  mingle  with  them  without  having  this 
baser  side  of  their  nature  often  thrust  upon  your 
notice.  And  yet  they  are  really  better  than  they 
often  seem  to  be.  And  to  deny  the  existence  of  a 
pure  disinterestedness,  a  genuine  honor,  a  true 
nobility  of  spirit  among  those  whom  we  call  the 
masses  of  mankind,  is  to  commit  one  of  the  greatest 
errors  into  which  it  is  possible  to  fall.  There  are 
reserves,  as  it  were,  in  human  nature,  of  heroism 
and  self-sacrifice  and  high  aspiration,  which  are 
always  latent  in  men's  souls,  and  are  often  mag- 
nificently revealed  in  their  action.  To  imagine 
that  they  are  not  there  because  they  do  not  show 
themselves  to  us  all  the  time,  is  as  if  one  were  to 
deny  the  reality  of  those  prodigious  fires  that  are 
slumbering  in  the  heart  of  the  earth  because  every 
day  is  not  marked  by  a  volcanic  eruption,  or  to  assert 
that  there  is  no  electricity  in  the  atmosphere  because 
the  roll  of  the  thunder  is  not  constantly  heard. 
One  sometimes  brings  disaster  on  himself  by 
excessive  confidence  in  the  honor,  truthfulness,  and 
high-mindedness  of  others.  But  he  who  goes  to 
the  opposite  extreme,  and  adopts  the  old  Latin 
maxim  that  every  man  should  be  presumed  to  be  a 
wolf  until  you  find  out  that  he  is  not,  makes  a 
practical    mistake   whose   consequences   are   more 


The   Practical  Man's  Mistakes    131 

serious  still.  A  man  who  has  his  own  ideals,  and 
believes  that  others  also  have  theirs,  who  is  not 
afraid  to  trust  them,  who  boldly  appeals  to  them  in 
the  interest  of  that  which  is  noble  and  true,  shows 
a  clearer  perception  of  what  they  really  are,  than 
your  practical  man  who  thinks  he  knows  them  so 
well.  I  do  not  say  that  this  view  of  human  nature 
is  more  attractive  than  the  other.  I  say  that  the 
candid  observation  of  life  and  the  careful  study  of 
history  show  it  to  be  more  accurate  also.  The 
practical  man  professes  to  have  great  respect  for 
facts,  and  the  fact  is  that  men  in  general  are  a  great 
deal  better  than  he  believes  them  to  be. 

This  is  his  first  mistake.  The  second  is  that  by 
his  repudiation  of  what  he  calls  idealism,  he  de- 
prives himself  of  the  power  to  do  much  for  his 
fellow-men.  You  might  suppose,  that  with  the  long 
attention  he  has  given  to  the  conditions  of  success- 
ful work,  and  with  his  clear  understanding  of 
human  deficiencies  and  wants,  he  would  be  just  the 
man  to  help  forward  the  work  of  moral  and  social 
reform ;  the  man  who  would  be  most  certain  not  to 
waste  his  strength ;  the  man  to  whom  others  would 
go,  with  the  assurance  that  they  would  receive  from 
him  the  most  judicious  counsel  and  the  most  effective 
aid.  But  the  trouble  with  him  is  that  he  lacks  the 
motive  which  must  be  behind  every  real  effort  for 
the  moral  improvement  of  others.  He  has  no  strong 
faith  in  human  nature.  He  has  no  large  conception 
of  what  it  may  become.     He  has  no  hope  of  any 


132  Life  Indeed 

considerable  improvement  in  its  actual  condition ; 
and  consequently  he  lacks  all  enthusiasm,  and  even 
boasts  of  his  lack  of  it.  But  it  requires  a  great 
energy  to  induce  any  one  to  labor  persistently,  and 
to  enable  him  to  labor  successfully,  for  the  welfare 
of  others.  It  involves  a  vast  amount  of  self-sacri- 
fice ;  it  requires  a  prodigious  deal  of  patience.  It 
will  not  be  done  by  any  one  who  has  not  within 
himself  an  inexhaustible  spring  of  courage  and  hope. 
All  these  the  man  of  ideals  has.  And  they  sustain 
him  under  discouragement.  They  inspire  him  with 
a  hope  that  never  fails  and  a  zeal  that  never  flags. 
It  is  a  fact  of  history  which  cannot  be  questioned 
that  all  the  men  who  have  really  helped  forward  in 
any  large  way  the  progress  of  the  human  race  have 
been  idealists  and  enthusiasts.  The  practical  man 
stands  by  and  criticises  and  sneers.  They  labor 
and  suffer  and  die.  And  he  is  forgotten.  And 
they  are  immortal.  In  a  certain  sense  he  was 
right.  The  things  they  strove  for  were  impossible. 
But  their  faith  and  enthusiasm  have  accomplished 
the  impossible,  as  faith  and  enthusiasm  are  always 
doing  and  will  do  to  the  end  of  time. 

Then,  again,  in  the  third  place,  the  practical 
man  who  has  dethroned  his  own  ideals,  and  who 
treats  the  ideals  of  others  as  an  empty  superstition, 
makes  the  serious  mistake  of  dooming  himself  to 
inevitable  deterioration.  It  has  been  well  said  that 
'*if  there  is  one  lesson  more  than  another  which 
history  has  to  teach,  it  is  this  :   that  without  fidelity 


The  Practical  Man's  Mistakes    133 

to  unrealized  ideals,  there  can  be  no  solid  advance- 
ment in  any  department  of  life.  And  the  secret  of 
all  retrograde  experiences,  whether  in  individuals 
or  in  nations,  is  to  be  found  in  their  loss  of  those 
spiritual  elements  in  man  which  have  hitherto 
lighted  and  fed  the  torch  of  civilization.  No 
greater  misfortune  can  possibly  happen  to  a  man  or 
to  a  nation  than  that  which  arises  from  meagre  am- 
bitions and  a  cramped  and  petty  outlook.  It  is  not 
always  gross  and  sensual  things  by  which  they  are 
degraded.  It  is  enough  that  they  should  be  im- 
mersed in  things  mundane  and  material,  given  over 
to  the  brittle  gods  of  an  unideal  life,  to  the  lust  of 
wealth,  the  love  of  ease  and  self-indulgence,  to  the 
things  that  are  below  the  level  of  the  house-tops, 
rather  than  to  those  which  dwell  among  the  stars." 
This  process  of  deterioration  is  subtle  and  slow, 
but  it  inevitably  takes  place  in  one  who  has  re- 
nounced his  ideals  and  has  become  a  worshiper  of 
that,  and  that  alone,  which  lies  within  the  horizon 
of  his  actual  vision.  No  one  can  remain  stationary 
in  his  moral  and  spiritual  life,  any  more  than  a  star 
can  stand  still  in  its  orbit.  He  will  go  forward  or 
backward,  upward  or  downward,  as  he  is  led  on  by 
high  ideals,  or  suffers  himself  to  be  pulled  down  by 
earthly  views  and  sensuous  passions.  Emerson's 
quaint  phrase,  **  Hitch  your  wagon  to  a  star,"  has 
in  it  a  great  truth.  The  world,  with  its  low  stand- 
ards, its  fierce  competitions,  its  glittering  rewards, 
is  certain  to  enchant  and  enchain  the  mind  that  is 


134  Life  Indeed 

not  always  peering  into  the  invisible  and  reaching 
forth  toward  the  ideal.  There  is  but  a  step  be- 
tween what  is  often  called  a  practical  view  of  things 
and  utter  cynicism  and  misanthropy.  Even  if  our 
ideals  were  mere  phantasms,  the  power  to  form  and 
the  disposition  to  pursue  them  would  be  our  only 
salvation  from  the  pessimism  which  is  infecting  like 
an  Asiatic  plague  so  many  spirits  in  our  time.  But 
it  can  never  be  that  an  illusion  is  better  than  the 
truth.  And  the  reason  why  a  man  who  insults  the 
ideal  inevitably  goes  down,  is  that  he  has  com- 
mitted sacrilege  against  the  truth  -,  he  has  insulted 
human  nature  ;  and  he  pays  the  penalty  of  his  sin 
by  being  forced  downward  to  the  level  on  which  he 
falsely  imagined  that  other  men  w^re  living. 

And  then,  once  more,  he  who  takes  such  views 
of  life,  and  regulates  his  conduct  by  them,  cuts 
himself  off  from  sympathy  with  all  the  noblest  and 
best  of  mankind.  There  have  been  cynics  hereto- 
fore in  every  age, — men  who  scoffed  at  the  ideal ; 
who  measured  their  fellow-men  by  the  standard  of 
their  own  miserable  ideas  and  aspirations;  men 
without  faith  in  humanity,  or  in  a  God  whose  abso- 
lute righteousness  and  truth  are  reflected  back,  how- 
ever imperfectly,  from  the  character  of  the  highest 
creature  He  has  made.  There  have  always  been 
such  men.  But  the  great  mass  of  mankind,  cer- 
tainly the  great  leaders  of  mankind,  have  been  men 
of  ideals.  All  the  progress  which  the  race  has 
made,  from  the  grey  dawn  of  its  history  down  to 


The  Practical  Man's  Mistakes    135 

the  present  day,  has  been  the  result  of  its  often 
bhnd  but  still  persistent  endeavor  to  reach  an  ever- 
receding  goal.  Men  have  never  been  content  with 
the  knowledge,  the  power,  the  comfort,  or  even  the 
moral  excellence,  which  they  have  at  any  moment 
attained.  They  have  always  been  reaching  out  and 
pressing  on  toward  something  higher  and  better, 
toward  an  ideal,  in  other  words,  imperfectly  con- 
ceived, perhaps,  and  never  actually  realized,  but 
ever  drawing  them  upward  with  an  irresistible 
power.  Here  is  the  secret  of  the  progress  that  has 
thus  far  been  made  in  individual  character,  in  so- 
cial refinement  and  purity,  in  civil  liberty  and 
order.  The  ideal  of  what  a  man  should  be,  of 
what  society  should  be,  of  what  the  state  should 
be,  has  always  floated  before  men's  minds,  not  like 
a  phantom  of  their  own  crude  imagination,  but  like 
an  angel  flashing  upon  them  out  of  some  higher 
sphere.  It  is  often  saddening  to  study  the  wayward 
and  halting  course  by  which  they  have  struggled 
onward  to  the  point  at  which  they  stand  to-day ; 
but  there  is  also  something  magnificent  in  the  sight 
of  this  irrepressible  and  splendid  effort  to  rise  out 
of  actual  conditions  of  ignorance  and  suffering,  of 
confusion  and  wrong,  into  something  nearer  the 
ideal  of  personal  and  public  happiness  and  virtue. 

And  now  the  man  who  says  that  all  this  is  merely 
chasing  a  will-o'-the-wisp,  that  it  is  better  to  rest 
content  with  things  as  they  are,  that  anything  like  a 
thoroughgoing  reform  in  personal  character  or   in 


136  Life   Indeed 

the  life  of  society  is  an  idle  dream, — such  a  man 
simply  steps  aside  out  of  the  ranks,  while  the  march 
of  humanity  goes  on.  He  has  no  share  in  it.  He 
has  no  sympathy  with  it.  He  can  do  nothing  to 
help  it.  But  past  him  or  over  him  it  will  go,  till 
somewhere  and  at  some  time  the  vision  is  fulfilled, 
and  the  ideal  so  long  cherished  and  so  long  sought 
is  actually  realized. 

For  humanity  sweeps  onward ;    where  to-day  the  martyr 

stands, 
On  the  morrow  crouches  Judas,  with  the  silver  in  his  hands ; 
Far  in  front  the  cross  stands  ready  and  the  crackling  fagots 

burn, 
While  the  hooting  mob  of  yesterday  in  silent  awe  return 
To  glean  up  the  scattered  ashes  into  History's  golden  urn. 

I  submit  to  you,  then,  that  it  is  the  part  of  prac- 
tical wisdom  to  respect  your  ideals,  to  believe  in 
them,  to  cherish  them ;  for  this  is  at  least  one 
secret  of  the  highest  happiness,  the  largest  growth, 
the  widest  usefulness.  Beware  of  the  influences 
which  would  tend  to  persuade  you  that  it  is  not 
worth  while  to  expect  or  strive  for  anything  really 
great  and  noble,  either  for  yourself  or  others ;  that 
you  will  always  be  substantially  what  you  now  are ; 
and  that  the  world  is  destined  to  drift  on  forever, 
very  much  as  it  is  doing  now.  Beware  of  the  per- 
nicious influence  of  those  who  tell  you  that  in  the 
realm  of  personal  character,  in  society,  and  in  the 
state,  the  evils  which  you  observe  and  deplore  can- 


The  Practical  Man's  Mistakes    137 

not  be  remedied,  that  you  must  accept  men  and 
things  as  you  find  them,  and  put  up  with  what  you 
cannot  help.  It  is  not  so.  Not  the  practical  man 
but  the  idealist  holds  the  true  philosophy  of  life. 
You  need  not  always  live,  unless  you  choose  to  do 
so,  on  the  low,  malarial  plains  where  you  are  now 
dwelling.  The  hills  are  all  around  you,  calling  you 
up  to  their  wider  vision  and  their  purer  air.  What 
if  you  cannot  reach  the  shining  summits,  or  tarry 
there  even  if  you  should  succeed  in  scaling  them  ? 
You  can  reach  a  higher  level  than  that  whereon  you 
are  standing  now.  The  idealist  is  not  of  necessity 
an  idiot.  He  does  not  for  a  moment  suppose  that 
absolute  truth  and  absolute  righteousness  can  be  at- 
tained here  in  this  imperfect  and  sinful  world.  But 
he  will  not  for  this  reason  cease  to  aspire  after 
them,  or  to  strive  to  come  as  near  to  them  as  he 
can.  And  in  this  he  finds  the  glory  of  life  and  its 
unfailing  inspiration.  He  finds  his  outlook  broad- 
ened and  his  character  strengthened  and  elevated, 
even  though  he  has  not  reached,  and  knows  that  he 
will  never  reach  in  this  life,  the  absolute  ideal  that 
he  seeks.  But  he  knows  also  that  his  security  as 
well  as  his  happiness  lies  in  keeping  it  steadily  in 
view. 

And  if  this  is  the  dictate  of  practical  wisdom,  it 
certainly  is  the  great  lesson  of  the  gospel.  Reli- 
gion, as  the  practical  man  says,  is  concerned  with 
ideals.  Ideals  so  absolute,  so  glorious,  as  those 
which  are  contained   in    the  gospel  of  the  Lord 


138  Life  Indeed 

Jesus  Christ,  can  be  found  nowhere  else.  But 
here  precisely  is  the  secret  of  its  power,  not  over  the 
imagination  only,  but  over  the  conscience  and  the 
heart.  It  appeals  to  our  natural  idealism.  But 
instead  of  some  vague  conception  of  our  own 
minds,  it  gives  us  a  definite  statement  of  God's 
thought  and  purpose  for  us.  And  it  sets  before  us 
the  highest  and  best  of  all  possible  ideals,  embodied 
in  the  person  of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ.  No  man 
can  speak  lightly  of  the  ideal  life,  who  believes  in 
the  Bible  and  tries  to  live  according  to  it.  For  it 
is  perfectly  uncompromising  in  its  demand  that  we 
shall  be  satisfied  with  nothing  less  than  the  persist- 
ent and  determined  endeavor  to  imitate  the  ex- 
ample and  keep  the  commandments  of  our  divine 
Master.  If  it  required  anything  less  than  this,  or 
if  it  confirmed  us  in  our  moral  indifference  or 
hopelessness,  we  should  know  that  it  was  not  from 
God.  It  would  not  meet  our  spiritual  needs.  It 
would  have  no  power  to  renew  and  ennoble  the 
secret  sources  of  character.  And  therefore  we  who 
believe  and  rejoice  in  it  as  the  word  of  God,  are 
bound  to  manifest  a  spirit  of  loyalty  to  the  highest 
ideals  in  everything  we  have  to  do, — in  our  daily 
conduct,  in  our  domestic  life,  in  our  business,  in 
our  studies,  in  our  various  professions,  in  our  obli- 
gations and  our  opportunities  as  citizens.  Any- 
thing less  than  this  involves  disloyalty  to  Christ, 
disbelief  in  our  own  souls,  unfaithfulness  to  our 
heavenly  calling.     We  may  not,  we  certainly  shall 


The  Practical  Man's  Mistakes    139 

not,  in  this  life  attain  the  shining  mark  on  which 
our  eyes  are  fixed.  But  if  the  word  of  God  may 
be  trusted,  we  shall  reach  it  hereafter,  when  at  last 
we  shall  be  like  Him  whom  we  have  followed  to 
the  end. 


DIVINE  RESTRAINTS 


And  the  Lord  shut  htm  in. — Genesis  vii.  i6. 


VIII 

DIVINE  RESTRAINTS 

Much  is  said  in  the  Bible  of  the  freedom  of  the 
people  of  God.  The  unknown  author  of  the  one 
hundred  and  nineteenth  Psalm  rises  out  of  the 
somewhat  monotonous  strain  in  which  his  poem  is 
composed,  into  one  of  exultation  and  triumph, 
when  he  exclaims,  ^'  I  shall  walk  at  liberty,  because 
I  seek  Thy  precepts."  And  the  same  inspiring 
word  is  often  on  the  lips  of  the  apostle  to  the  Gen- 
tiles. "Ye  were  called  for  freedom,"  he  writes  to 
the  Galatians;  *'for  freedom  did  Christ  set  us 
free."  And  in  his  letter  to  the  Romans  his  deep 
and  powerful  argument  seems  to  break  into  song, 
when  he  speaks  of  **  the  glorious  liberty  of  the  chil- 
dren of  God."  Separated  by  several  centuries 
from  each  other,  living  at  different  stages  of  the 
divine  revelation,  these  two  men  were  agreed  in 
this :  that  the  true  freedom  of  man  is  in  obedience 
to  God.  The  psalmist  was  under  the  law,  and  re- 
joiced in  it ;  he  found  his  liberty  in  obeying  its 
precepts.  The  apostle  rejoiced  that  the  Mosaic 
law  was  abolished.  It  seemed  to  him  a  bondage, 
in  comparison  with  the  liberty  which  was  gained 
by  faith  in  Christ.  And  yet  there  is  no  contradic- 
tion between  them.  Each  utters  the  best  and 
143 


144  Life  Indeed 

highest  thought  of  his  age.  The  truth  which  is 
common  to  both  is  that  ahenation  from  God  and 
subjection  to  sin  is  a  species  of  slavery,  and  that  he 
only  is  free  who  is  brought  into  right  relations  to 
his  Maker.  Such  a  man  is  free  from  the  sense  of 
wilful  wrongdoing,  and  the  condemnation  which 
this  implies — the  reproaches  of  conscience,  the  just 
anger  of  God.  He  is  free  from  fear  concerning 
the  future.  He  is  free  from  the  fetters  of  false  mo- 
tives and  evil  habits  and  partial  and  erroneous 
judgments.  He  is  free  from  bondage  to  the  opin- 
ions, the  flatteries,  the  threats  of  his  fellow-men. 
He  is  free  from  subjection  to  the  outward  and  vis- 
ible world,  and  is  brought  into  relations  of  famil- 
iarity and  of  sympathy  with  the  larger  and  more 
real  world  that  is  spiritual  and  unseen.  Such  a 
man  is  lifted  above  the  accidents  of  life,  above  the 
passions,  the  prejudices  and  the  narrow  ambitions 
of  his  day ;  he  breathes  a  purer  air,  he  looks  out 
upon  a  wider  horizon.  His  sense  of  freedom  gives 
him  a  sense  of  power  and  a  desire  for  a  larger  ac- 
tivity. And  as  he  comes  into  more  perfect  har- 
mony with  God,  his  spirit  becomes  more  confident 
and  buoyant  and  exultant,  till  at  last  it  bursts  all 
earthly  limitations,  and  passes  into  the  complete 
and  immortal  freedom  of  the  sons  of  God  on  high. 
All  this  is  true,  but  there  are  very  few  Christians 
who  are  not  more  distinctly  sensible  of  the  re- 
straints which  God  often  imposes  upon  those  who 
love  and  serve  Him,  than  of  the  liberty  to  which 


Divine  Restraints  145 

He  has  called  them.  Something  of  that  sense  of 
emancipation  which  seems  to  irradiate  the  language 
of  psalmist  and  apostle,  we  too  have  doubtless  felt ; 
and  yet  who  of  us  can  enter  into  the  full  meaning 
of  their  inspiring  words  and  make  them  wholly  his 
own  ?  And  the  reason  for  this  is  not  merely  that 
we  are  conscious  that  our  obedience  is  still  imper- 
fect and  our  faith  wavering  and  weak,  that  we  have 
not  surrendered  ourselves  so  completely  as  the  one 
had  done  to  the  authority  of  the  law,  or  the  other 
to  the  loving  persuasions  of  the  gospel ;  that  our 
spiritual  freedom  is  hampered  because  our  spiritual 
vision  is  clouded  and  our  spiritual  life  is  languid. 
It  is  not  that,  though  we  may  feel  that  that  is  sadly 
true.  But  God  often  seems  to  have  shut  us  in, 
within  limitations  at  which  we  chafe,  by  restraints 
which  are  as  fetters  on  our  enjoyment  and  our  ac- 
tivity. We  know  well  enough  that  it  is  wTong  to 
murmur  at  them,  but  we  are  often  distracted  be- 
tween the  desire  to  accept  and  submit  to  them,  as 
His  appointment  for  us,  and  the  desire  to  break 
away  from  and  rise  above  them,  into  the  freedom 
of  our  heavenly  calling.  It  may  help  us,  therefore, 
if  we  consider  some  of  these  restraints,  in  order  to 
see,  if  we  can,  what  they  are  meant  for  and  how 
we  ought  to  regard  them. 

But  it  is  important,  at  the  outset,  to  observe  how 
often  it  is  the  man  who  has  shut  himself  in,  and  not 
God  who  has  imposed  restraints  upon  him.  We 
are  continually  building  barriers  around  ourselves 


146  Life  Indeed 

and  then  complaining  that  our  freedom  is  abridged. 
We  shut  ourselves  up,  for  example,  within  narrow- 
views  of  truth,  refusing  to  let  our  minds  go  forth 
and  up  to  the  full  breadth  and  height  of  the  di- 
vine revelation.  It  is  sometimes  the  result  of  early 
education,  which  has  fixed  us  in  a  certain  concep- 
tion of  the  great  facts  and  doctrines  of  the  gospel, 
so  that  it  never  occurs  to  us  to  inquire  whether  the 
truth  of  God  and  of  our  relation  to  Him  may  not 
be  vaster  and  grander  than  that  which  we  hold. 
It  may  be  that  some  other  acute  but  contracted 
mind  has  forced  its  opinions  upon  us,  and  we  con- 
tentedly accept  them,  without  asking  if,  beyond 
the  domain  thus  mapped  out  before  us,  there  may 
not  be  other  seas  and  continents,  stretching  away  into 
the  distance.  It  is  simple  ignorance  sometimes,  and 
sometimes  indifference,  and  sometimes  a  voluntary 
and  wilful  refusal  to  lift  up  our  eyes  and  behold  the 
things  which  God  is  ready  to  reveal  to  our  knowl- 
edge ;  and  sometimes  it  is  a  timid  temper,  a  want 
of  faith  in  the  truth  and  in  God ;  or  it  is  an  un- 
willingness to  be  disturbed  in  opinions  that  have 
become  familiar  to  us,  and  in  prejudices  that  have 
grown  so  tough  with  age  that  we  mistake  them  for 
principles ;  it  is  some  one  of  these  habits  of  mind 
that  shuts  us  up  within  a  creed,  which  in  spite  of 
the  truth  that  it  contains,  becomes  false  because  of 
the  truth  which  it  excludes.  When  shall  we  learn 
that  truth  is  one,  and  that  God  has  revealed  Him- 
self in  many  ways?      The  astronomer  catches  on 


Divine  Restraints  147 

the  lens  of  his  spectroscope  a  ray  of  sunlight ;  he 
enumerates  to  you  the  chemical  elements  which  he 
finds  in  the  blazing  and  bubbling  mass  from  which 
it  streams,  and  he  tells  you  that  that  is  the  way  in 
which  you  are  to  think  of  the  sun.  And  the  poet 
sees  it  rise  over  the  Alps,  touching  every  crystal 
peak  with  a  crimson  glory  and  wakening  the  valleys 
into  life  and  song,  and  it  stirs  his  soul  with  the 
sentiment  of  worship,  and  he  greets  it  with  a  hymn. 
And  the  explorer,  lost  amid  the  trackless  expanse 
of  the  polar  ice,  waits  for  it  through  the  long 
Arctic  night,  and  to  him  it  means  health  and  hope, 
escape  from  the  living  tomb  that  encloses  him,  and 
restoration  to  the  smiling  and  happy  home  that  he 
has  left.  And  so  it  is  with  truth — the  truth  of 
God's  love,  for  example,  the  truth  of  Christ's 
atonement ;  it  is  not  the  same  thing  to  all  men,  but 
it  is  larger  and  grander  and  more  many-sided  than 
any  man's  conception  of  it.  God  pours  it,  as  in 
floods  of  light  around  us,  and  calls  upon  us  to 
come  forth,  out  of  the  narrow  views  in  which  we 
have  imprisoned  our  own  minds,  into  a  large  lib- 
erty of  thought. 

We  suffer,  in  very  much  the  same  way,  an  un- 
necessary impoverishment  in  our  spiritual  life,  be- 
cause we  shut  ourselves  up  within  narrow  ex- 
pectations. "  According  to  thy  faith  be  it  unto 
thee,"  is  a  far-reaching  law.  It  is  one  of  the  laws 
which  govern  attainment  and  achievement  in  the 
secular  world,  where  knowledge,  wealth,  influence. 


148  Life  Indeed 

success  of  any  kind,  is  in  great  measure  propor- 
tioned to  ambition  and  effort.  The  school-boy  who 
thinks  that  he  never  can  know  much,  never  will 
know  much.  The  man  who  never  expects  to  suc- 
ceed, never  succeeds.  And  the  same  thing  is  em- 
phatically true  of  the  spiritual  life.  Why  is  it  that 
our  Christian  enthusiasm  is  so  feeble,  and  our 
Christian  joy  so  small ;  that  we  are  conscious  of  so 
little  progress  in  holiness,  so  little  freedom  and  ex- 
hilaration in  our  communion  with  God  ?  It  is  not 
because  He  has  condemned  us  to  live  as  we  are 
living,  because  there  is  nothing  more  in  the  Chris- 
tian experience  than  we  have  attained,  or  nothing 
more,  at  least,  for  us.  There  are  still  mounts  of 
vision  on  which  the  human  soul  may  stand  transfig- 
ured, as  Jesus  stood  on  the  summit  of  Tabor,  while 
celestial  forms  fill  all  the  air,  and  a  divine  compan- 
ionship and  communion  is  realized,  which  is  a 
prophecy  of  heaven.  There  are  still  high  places 
of  Christian  experience,  on  which  your  soul  and 
mine  may  walk  with  the  jubilant  and  triumphant 
step  of  those  who  are  enfolded  in  a  divine  protec- 
tion and  upheld  and  guided  by  an  almighty  arm. 
And  if  we  do  not  reach  them,  it  is  largely  because 
we  do  not  expect  to  reach  them.  They  are  not,  we 
say,  for  us  to  tread.  We  are  not  contented  where 
we  are,  or  we  are  contented.  In  either  case,  we  do 
not  rise  to  higher  things,  because  we  do  not  expect 
to  rise.  Or  we  push  into  the  indefinite  future,  into 
the  last  years  of  life  on  earth,  or  even,  perhaps,  into 


Divine  Restraints  149 

the  life  beyond,  the  fulfilment  of  a  hope  which 
might  be  fulfilled  at  once.  But  the  great  possibili- 
ties of  the  Christian  life  are  possibilities  for  every 
Christian.  Not  to  a  few  only,  but  to  all  who  are 
pure  in  heart,  is  it  given  to  see  God.  Not  to  now 
and  then  one  alone,  but  to  all  who  abide  in  Christ,  is 
the  freedom  which  He  has  promised,  granted.  It 
is  not  He,  who  has  shut  us  into  our  narrow,  un- 
fruitful, joyless  experience,  but  we  who  have  not 
faith  enough  in  Him,  or  love  enough  for  Him,  to 
come  forth  into  a  larger  life. 

So  again,  in  the  third  place,  with  Christian  ac- 
tivity. There  is  nothing  more  common  than  to 
hear  a  man  lament  that  He  is  doing  and  can  do  so 
little  for  Christ.  He  is  hedged  in  and  hampered 
by  a  thousand  restraints.  He  longs  to  break  away 
from  them  and  be  free  for  some  truly  great  and  ef- 
fective work.  But  look  more  closely  at  these  re- 
straints, my  brother,  and  see  if  they  are  not  such 
as  you  have  fastened  on  yourself.  Is  there  any- 
thing to  hinder  your  doing  God  service — service  of 
the  grandest  and  noblest  kind — except  your  simple 
unwillingness  to  assume  the  responsibilities,  or  to 
make  the  sacrifices,  which  it  involves  ?  Is  it  not 
your  love  of  your  ease,  or  your  absorbing  interest 
in  your  business,  which  alone  stands  in  the  way  of 
your  religious  activity  ?  Or  is  it  not  some  morbid 
feeling  of  timidity  or  self-distrust,  which  you  ought 
to  break  over,  and  which  you  would  break  over,  if 
you  were  really  as  intent  as  you  think  you  are  on  do- 


150  Life  Indeed 

ing  good  ?  Or  is  not  the  difficulty  this,  perhaps,  that 
while  you  are  waiting  for  a  wider  sphere,  you  are  not 
yourself  widening  your  sphere,  by  filling  it  full  of 
acts  of  usefulness  and  love  ?  There  is  nothing  in 
the  world  that  grows  like  the  opportunity  of  doing 
good.  If  you  want  to  do  more,  do  it,  and  the  more 
you  do,  the  more  you  will  want  to  do.  But  do  not 
at  least  cheat  yourself  with  the  delusion  that  God 
has  shut  you  up  to  a  life  of  inaction,  when  it  is 
your  own  selfishness  or  your  own  worldliness  which 
alone  hinders  your  religious  activity. 

But  when  this  has  been  recognized,  that  the 
restraints  at  which  we  murmur  are  often  those  of 
our  own  making,  then  we  must  also  go  on  to 
recognize  the  fact  that  God  does  often  shut  us  in. 
He  does  this,  for  example,  sometimes  by  the  limi- 
tations of  natural  capacity  which  He  has  fixed  for 
us.  It  is  not  possible  for  us,  by  the  very  constitu- 
tion of  our  minds,  to  take  those  broad  and  lofty 
views  of  truth  which  others  find  so  satisfying  or 
inspiring.  A  narrow  creed  may  be  the  only  one 
which  we  can  firmly  grasp  and  hold,  and  they  who 
are  tempted  to  blame  us  for  this,  should  remember 
that  it  is  not  so  much  our  fault  as  our  infirmity. 
Or  our  natures  are  too  cold  to  be  easily  kindled  to 
such  a  fervor  of  Christian  feeling  as  that  which 
others  exhibit,  and  they  should  not  forget  that  we 
may  be  as  sincere  and  as  earnest  as  they,  while  we 
are  longing,  perhaps,  for  an  emotional  experience 
of  which  we  are  simply  incapable.     So  there  are 


Divine  Restraints  151 

forms  of  Christian  activity  for  which  we  are  not 
fitted,  and  however  pure  may  be  the  motive  with 
which  we  enter  upon  them,  God  has  shut  us  up 
to  failure  in  them  by  denying  to  us  the  natural  gifts 
which  alone  insure  success.  It  may,  perhaps,  seem 
strange  that  He  should  thus  refuse  to  any  man  the 
clearest  vision  of  truth,  the  highest  intensity  of  feel- 
ing, to  which  he  can  aspire,  and  stranger  still  that 
He  should  suffer  any  faithful  laborer  in  His  service 
to  miss  the  end  for  which  he  has  toiled,  because  of 
some  involuntary  and  unconscious  defect  of  mind 
or  of  temperament,  by  which  he  is  in  advance  con- 
demned to  disappointment.  But  this  is  certainly 
one  of  the  ways  in  which  He  shuts  men  in. 

Another  is  by  the  narrow  conditions  of  their 
lives.  I  do  not  mean  to  speak  of  those — the 
almost  innumerable  multitude  of  men — who  seem 
to  be  placed  by  the  providence  of  God  beyond  the 
reach  of  every  elevating  influence;  who  are  shut 
in  by  a  deadly  circle  of  associations  and  of  cir- 
cumstances which  make  their  ruin  seem  almost 
inevitable;  who  appear  to  have  no  possibility  of 
escape.  The  frightful  picture  which  the  weird 
fancy  of  the  novelist  has  painted  and  which  haunts 
the  imagination  of  the  reader  like  a  nightmare,  of 
the  prisoner  who  saw  that  the  walls  of  his  dungeon 
were  slowly  but  steadily  closing  in  upon  him, 
causing  him  an  agony  of  suspense  which  was  even 
more  horrible  than  the  certain  and  terrible  death 
that  awaited  him — it  is  not  an  image  too  vivid  and 


152  Lite  Indeed 

appalling  of  the  condition  of  thousands  who  are 
living  and  perishing  around  us.  But  it  is  not  now 
of  them  that  I  would  speak.  The  contrast  of  their 
dark  and  hopeless  lives — blots  upon  our  civilization, 
reproaches  upon  our  Christianity — makes  the  mean- 
est and  poorest  of  our  lives  seem  large  and  rich  and 
free.  But  just  because  of  our  wider  outlook  and 
our  higher  aspirations,  we  feel  the  restraints  amid 
which  we  are  placed.  The  petty  cares  of  daily 
life,  the  crowding  and  conflicting  duties  with  which 
our  busy  hours  are  filled,  the  anxieties  and  fears 
and  responsibilities  by  which  we  are  burdened  and 
perplexed, — how  they  exhaust  our  energies  and 
baffle  our  ambitions  and  fetter  our  spiritual  freedom. 
We  are  not  engaged  in  a  mad  race  after  wealth,  we 
are  simply  fighting  the  great  battle  of  existence. 
We  are  discharging  as  well  as  we  can  our  duty  to 
ourselves,  to  society,  and  to  those  who  are  de- 
pendent upon  us.  He  who  gave  the  command- 
ment, ''  Remember  the  Sabbath  to  keep  it  holy," — 
did  He  not  say  also,  ''  Six  days  shalt  thou  labor 
and  do  all  thy  work"  ?  And  whatever  the  form 
or  sphere  of  our  labor  may  be,  whether  in  court- 
room or  counting-room  or  school-room,  whether  it 
is  the  care  of  vast  financial  interests,  or  the  care  of 
the  sick,  or  the  care  of  little  children,  whether  it  is 
a  public  service  or  a  domestic  service,  it  is  a 
necessity  imposed  upon  us  in  the  providence  of 
God,  and  we  cannot  escape  it.  It  is  true  that  a 
man's  life  does  not  consist  in  the  abundance  of  the 


Divine  Restraints  163 

things  that  he  possesses ;  and  yet  much  of  the  life 
of  every  man  and  of  every  woman  must  inevitably 
be  occupied  with  things  that  have  no  evident  reli- 
gious relations  and  that  seem  in  their  influence 
directly  opposed  to  all  religious  activity  and 
progress.  We  are  shut  in  by  the  conditions  of  our 
physical  and  social  life,  and  whether  we  chafe  at 
its  restraints  or  meekly  submit  to  them,  we  cannot 
throw  them  off. 

And  yet  the  busiest  and  most  careworn  life  is  free 
compared  with  that  of  one  on  whom  some  sore  dis- 
aster has  fallen.  The  invalid  who  is  fastened  for 
weeks  and  months  to  a  bed  of  helplessness  and 
pain,  who  is  withdrawn  from  all  wonted  ministries 
of  duty  and  affection,  and  made  to  be  the  object  of 
the  pity  and  care  and  anxiety  of  others, — how  sud- 
denly and  sadly  life  is  narrowed  for  such  a  sufferer  ! 
Nothing  to  do,  but  everything  to  bear ;  the  range 
of  vision  bounded  by  the  walls  of  a  single  darkened 
room,  which  is  like  a  prison  to  the  restless  soul ; 
the  bright  and  eager  faculties  of  mind  arrested  in 
their  accustomed  activity  and  set  to  preying  on 
themselves,  or  clouded  and  weakened  by  the 
poison  of  disease, — what  a  sad,  but  what  a  com- 
mon experience  it  is  of  the  way  in  which  God  shuts 
us  in  ! 

Is  it  possible  that  there  can  be  any  still  closer 
restraints  imposed  by  Him  on  the  free  human 
spirit  ?  Yes,  the  bonds  of  sorrow  are  even  tighter 
and  more  galling  than  those  of  physical  feebleness 


154  Life  Indeed 

and  pain.  The  body  is  vigorous  and  active ;  it  is 
the  heart  which  is  enchained.  The  shadows  of 
a  great  grief  have  fallen  upon  you,  and  you  are 
walking  on  in  solitude  and  darkness.  Between  you 
and  the  living  world,  in  which  just  now  you  were 
doing  your  work  so  easily  and  so  well,  there  has 
risen  an  impenetrable  mist,  in  which  you  are 
moving  aimless  and  bewildered.  You  hear  from 
beyond  it  the  voices  of  your  fellow-men,  engaged  in 
the  free  and  joyous  activity  in  which  you  so  lately 
had  your  share,  and  they  are  calling  you  to  come 
forth  out  of  your  sorrow  into  the  liberty  of  thought 
and  feeling  that  you  have  lost.  But  you  cannot 
come  out  of  it,  and  you  would  not  if  you  could. 
There  is  a  sacredness  in  such  an  isolation  and 
seclusion,  which  you  do  not  desire  or  dare  to 
violate.  It  is  the  hand  of  God  that  has  drawn 
these  curtains  of  darkness  around  you,  and  you 
cannot  but  wait  till  He  shall  lift  them  and  let  in 
upon  you  the  brightness  of  the  day. 

Or,  once  more,  the  restraints  which  He  imposes 
may  be  wholly  within  the  sphere  of  our  spiritual  life. 
There  are  no  outward  restrictions  on  our  liberty, 
but  we  are  in  bondage  to  doubt  or  fear  or  religious 
depression.  Our  faith  is  shaken  in  some  cardinal 
point  or  doctrine  of  the  gospel  and  we  can  do  noth- 
ing until  it  is  restored.  Or  the  freshness  of  our 
Christian  feeling  has  vanished,  as  the  delicate  and 
tender  beauty  of  the  morning  is  lost  in  the  noon- 
day heat  and  glare.     We  used  to  know  the  joy  of 


Divine  Restraints  165 

God's  salvation,  the  mysterious  and  ineffable  sweet- 
ness of  a  loving  fellowship  with  Christ.  It  was 
the  glorious  liberty  of  which  the  apostle  speaks. 
But  we  have  lost  it,  and  now  religion  is  to  us  a 
weary  round  of  duties  and  a  longing  for  a  spiritual 
freedom,  which  would  be  like  heaven  itself,  if  we 
could  only  get  it  back.  There  are  such  periods  in 
the  lives  of  God's  true  children,  when  the  luminous 
presence  that  had  shone  upon  their  path  seems 
turned  to  darkness,  and  when  the  light  has  faded 
from  the  mercy-seat  itself. 

Does  it  not  sometimes  seem,  in  view  of  these 
various  ways  in  which  God  shuts  His  people  in,  as 
if  there  were  no  real  freedom  left  for  us  on  earth  ? 
Who  of  us  has  not  felt,  as  his  life  has  gone  for- 
ward, that  the  hand  of  God  was  laid  upon  him 
in  the  limitations  of  natural  capacity  by  which  he 
is  encompassed,  in  the  restrictive  conditions  of  his 
life,  in  sickness  or  in  son-ow,  in  religious  doubt  or 
desolation?  Who  of  us  has  not  felt  himself 
checked,  hampered,  arrested  even,  in  his  spiritual 
activity  and  progress  ?  Is  this,  we  may  well  ask, 
the  freedom  of  God's  children  ?  Is  this  the  light 
and  joy  and  liberty  of  faith  ? 

Let  me  point  you  for  an  answer  to  the  threefold 
purpose  which  even  now  we  are  able  to  discover,  in 
these  divinely  imposed  restraints, — the  purpose 
which  will  grow  still  plainer  to  us,  as  it  approaches 
its  accomplishment.  It  is,  for  one  thing,  a  purpose 
of   protection.     The   story  of   the   patriarch   from 


156  Life   Indeed 

whose  biography  the  text  is  taken,  may  at  least 
teach  us  that  first  lesson.  The  barriers  by  which 
God  shuts  us  in,  are  often  barriers  by  which  He 
shuts  out  from  us  temptations  to  which  we  should 
certainly  succumb.  The  necessity  of  labor  is  not 
a  burden,  it  is  a  defence.  The  seclusion  and  help- 
lessness of  sickness  is  not  a  chastisement,  it  is  a 
safeguard.  You  say  that  the  purely  worldly  cares 
with  which  your  hands  and  brain  are  filled,  are  a 
hindrance  to  your  spiritual  growth.  It  may  be  so, 
but  a  life  of  idleness  would  hinder  it  far  more. 
You  say  that  your  sickness  has  thwarted  your  plans 
of  Christian  usefulness.  It  may  be  so,  but  un- 
broken health  and  prosperity  would  have  diverted 
you  from  them  more  effectually  still.  Your  great 
affliction  has  shut  you  up  to  a  life  of  melancholy 
and  inaction.  I  grant  it,  but  you  were  perhaps 
becoming  too  deeply  immersed  in  a  happiness 
which  was  purely  of  this  world,  and  this  has 
brought  you  face  to  face  with  the  world  to  come. 
You  say  that  your  religious  depression  destroys  all 
the  zest  and  freedom  of  your  efforts  to  do  good.  I 
admit  and  understand  it,  but  you  were  perhaps  be- 
coming too  well  satisfied  with  the  good  that  you 
were  doing,  and  too  self-sufficient  and  self-confi- 
dent. You  did  not  realize,  you  do  not  yet 
realize,  perhaps,  the  dangers  that  were  threatening 
you  when  God  thus  laid  His  hand  upon  you  and 
in  His  mercy  shut  you  in. 

Or  His  purpose  in  it  may  be  one  of  discipline. 


Divine  Restraints  157 

It  almost  certainly  is  so.  Have  you  learned  all  the 
lessons  of  discipleship  so  well  that  you  no  longer 
need  His  training  ?  Perhaps  it  may  be  His  design 
to  teach  you  simply  that  you  have  not  done  this, 
that  you  are  willing  to  trust  and  serve  Him  when 
He  lets  you  roam  at  large,  but  are  impatient  and 
rebellious  under  His  restraints.  It  may  thus  be 
something  concerning  yourself  that  you  are  to 
learn,  or  something  new  concerning  Him, — the  real 
weakness  of  the  faith  that  you  thought  so  strong, 
the  irresoluteness  of  the  purpose  that  you  thought 
so  steadfast,  the  insufficiency  of  the  love  that  had 
led  you  to  say,  ''Though  I  should  die  with  Thee, 
or  for  Thee,  I  will  not  deny  Thee ;  "  or,  on  the 
other  hand,  the  power  of  His  presence  in  the  soul 
to  make  the  darkest  hour  radiant  and  the  most 
heavily  burdened  spirit  glad.  He  may  wish  to 
teach  you  the  great  lesson  of  duty,  that  all  labor  is 
to  be  made  sacred,  by  being  performed  in  a  spirit 
of  Christian  devotion ;  or  the  great  lesson  of  trust, 
that  our  desires  are  in  all  things  to  be  subjected  to 
His  will.  But  whatever  the  lesson  may  be,  be  sure 
of  this,  that  He  has  a  lesson  to  teach  you,  and  that 
when  you  have  learned  it.  He  will  bring  you  forth 
again  into  freedom  and  into  peace. 

Or  He  may,  in  the  third  place,  have  a  work 
for  you  to  do,  which  can  only  be  done  under  the 
very  limitations  which  He  has  imposed.  It  is 
for  you,  perhaps,  to  teach  others  how  meekly  and 
joyfully  these  limitations  may  be  borne.     It  is  for 


158  Life  Indeed 

you  to  show  how  fervent  and  pure  and  devout  in 
spirit  it  is  possible  to  remain  amid  all  the  stress  of 
secular  activity.  It  is  for  you  to  prove  again  to 
the  world,  what  has  been  proved  so  often  and  yet 
is  so  often  denied,  that  one  may  be  diligent  in  his 
business  and  yet  serve  the  Lord,  or  faithful  in  all 
the  endless  round  of  homely  duties,  and  yet  be 
spiritually  minded  and  full  of  the  gentleness  of 
Christ.  Or  still  again,  it  is  for  you  to  exhibit  a 
cheerfulness  which  pain  cannot  subdue,  a  serenity 
which  sorrow  cannot  disturb,  a  faith  and  zeal  which 
only  shine  out  more  brightly  through  the  doubts  by 
which  you  are  enveloped.  The  most  honored  and 
eminent  witnesses  for  God  are  not  they  whose  feet 
are  set  in  large  places  and  who  walk  with  buoyant 
step  in  pleasant  paths.  They  are  those  whom  He 
has  in  His  providence  shut  in  to  narrow  spheres,  to 
conditions  of  hardship  and  suffering,  but  who  there 
exhibit  a  trust  in  Him  that  never  wavers,  and  a 
fidelity  to  Him  that  never  fails. 

Here,  then,  are  the  lessons,  too  obvious  to  be 
missed,  too  important  to  be  disregarded,  to  which 
our  meditation  brings  us.  The  first  is  that  it  is 
never  for  His  own  sake,  but  always  for  ours,  that 
God  shuts  us  in.  Whether  it  be  to  save  us  from  a 
peril  by  which  we  are  threatened,  or  to  teach  us  a 
lesson  which  it  is  well  for  us  to  learn,  or  to  enable 
us  to  render  the  service  which  it  is  our  highest 
privilege  to  render,  His  very  restraints  are  forms  of 
blessing.     The  limitations  which  we  fasten  on  our- 


Divine  Restraints  159 

selves  through  prejudice,  indifference,  or  love  of 
this  world,  are  indeed  sources  of  weakness.  It  is 
by  them  that  we  are  held  back  from  the  growth  that 
we  long  for,  and  from  the  activity  and  the  happi- 
ness that  God  has  designed  for  us.  But  let  us  not 
murmur  at  those  which  are  imposed  upon  us  by 
Him.  The  little  valley,  shut  in  among  the  hills, 
might  better  complain  because  it  is  not  the  level 
'prairie  which  is  bounded  only  by  the  sky.  But  has 
it  not  also  its  use  and  its  beauty  ?  And  into  its 
quiet  depths  do  not  the  same  stars  shine  ? 

And  the  se|:ond  thing  is  that  freedom  is  found 
not  in  the  absence  of  restraints,  but  in  adjustment 
to  them.  There  is  indeed  a  liberty  of  the  children 
of  God,  and  it  belongs  to  those  about  whom  the 
cords  of  love  and  duty  are  most  tightly  wound.  It 
does  not  need  or  seek  a  larger  sphere  than  that 
which  He  has  assigned  it,  but  in  that  sphere  it  finds 
ample  and  harmonious  movement,  because  it  moves 
in  accordance  with  His  will.  Its  direction  is  up- 
ward, rather  than  outward,  and  that  sphere  is  large 
enough  for  it  which  brings  it  into  vital  contact  and 
communion  with  Him.  The  Christian  soldier,  who 
ranges  over  earth  and  sea,  has  not  always  the  liberty 
of  the  captive,  whose  cell  is  illumined  by  the  pres- 
ence in  it  of  the  Son  of  God.  And  the  narrowest  life 
is  sometimes  expanded  till  heaven  itself  is  embraced 
within  its  horizon,  when  the  spirit  has  learned  to 
forget  its  fetters  in  loving  and  joyous  fellowship 
with  Christ.     That  is  the  liberty  with  which  He 


160  Life  Indeed 

makes  free  those  to  whom  all  privation  and  hard- 
ship are  sweet,  which  hold  them  more  closely  to 
Him. 

And  that  is  the  prophecy  of  the  still  more  per- 
fect freedom  awaiting  us  hereafter.  We  sometimes 
think  of  the  world  to  come  as  a  sphere  where  all 
restraints  shall  be  removed,  and  the  soul  shall  be 
unhampered  in  its  immortal  career  of  happiness 
and  progress.  And  so  indeed  it  will  be  with  the 
limitations  of  sense  and  time,  of  earthly  toil,  of 
sickness  and  sorrow,  of  fear  and  doubt  and  death. 
But  the  sweet  restraints  of  love  and  of  obedience, 
and  of  holy  and  delightful  work,  will  be  around  us 
still.  Our  freedom  will  be  a  freedom  from  sin,  but 
not  from  duty,  from  suffering,  but  not  from  service. 
But  the  bonds  which  now  seem  to  us  the  fetters  of 
servitude  shall  there  be  the  symbols  of  citizenship, 
when  the  mortal  discipline  and  peril  shall  be  ended, 
and  the  celestial  security  and  fruition  begun.  God 
make  us  patient  and  faithful  here,  and  give  us  that 
freedom  and  that  peace  hereafter  ! 


IN  THE  FOOTSTEPS  OF  JESUS 


But  go  your  way,  tell  His  disciples  and  Peter 
that  He  goeth  before  you  into  Galilee  ;  there  shall 
ye  see  Him,  as  He  said  unto  you. — Mark  xvi.  7. 


IX 

IN  THE  FOOTSTEPS  OF  JESUS 

No  one  can  read  what  is  sometimes  called  the 
gospel  of  the  resurrection — the  inspired  but  still 
imperfect  narrative  of  the  wonderful  forty  days,  in 
which  our  Lord  showed  Himself  alive  after  His 
passion — without  observing  the  changed  relation  in 
which  He  stood  to  His  disciples.  Sometimes  it 
seems  as  if  nothing  were  altered.  He  sits  and  talks 
and  even  eats  with  them  as  before.  He  declares  to 
them  that  though  His  body  is  possessed  of  new 
properties  and  powers,  it  is  still  the  same  body 
w^hich  was  nailed  to  the  cross  and  laid  in  the  tomb. 
'*  I  am  not  a  spirit,"  He  said,  ''but  a  real,  living 
man.  Handle  Me,  and  see."  It  was  when  He 
was  walking  with  them  as  of  old,  along  the  familiar 
path  over  Olivet  toward  Bethany,  that  in  the  midst 
of  His  discourse.  He  was  taken  up  from  the  earth 
and  a  cloud  received  Him  out  of  their  sight. 

And  yet  evidently,  also.  He  was  not  with  them 
now  as  He  was  wont  formerly  to  be.  He  was  set 
free  from  the  limitations  of  physical  law  by  which 
He  had  been  bound.  He  came  and  went,  as  a 
spirit  might  come  and  go,  appearing  when  the  doors 
were  shut  and  then  mysteriously  vanishing  away. 
There  is  something  about  Him  which  strangely 
163 


164  Life  Indeed 

eludes  us.  He  seems  to  be  hovering  upon  the 
border  which  divides  the  sensible  from  the  unseen 
world. 

An  extremely  suggestive  illustration  of  this  is 
given  in  the  statement  made  by  the  angel  to  those 
who  were  early  at  the  sepulchre.  Recalling  a 
promise  that  had  been  made  by  Jesus  Himself  be- 
fore His  death,  He  said  :  *'  Go,  tell  His  disciples 
and  Peter  [the  particular  mention  of  Peter  is  espe- 
cially noteworthy]  that  He  goeth  before  you  into 
Galilee ;  there  shall  ye  see  Him,  as  He  said  unto 
you."  The  command  which  had  made  them  His 
disciples  was  a  command  to  follow  Him,  and  they 
had  literally  obeyed  it.  They  had  left  their  boats 
and  nets,  the  booths  where  they  carried  on  their 
business,  and  even  the  towns  and  cities  in  which 
they  had  been  living,  and  gone  forth  after  Him 
wherever  He  led  the  way.  They  had  walked  with 
Him  up  and  down  the  whole  length  of  Palestine, 
from  Nazareth  to  Jerusalem,  from  Jerusalem  back 
to  Nazareth,  more  than  once.  But  it  had  com- 
monly been  with  Him.  If  they  were  His  follow- 
ers, they  were  also  His  companions.  He  was  al- 
ways in  the  midst  of  them.  Sometimes,  even.  He 
had  followed  them,  as  when  He  sent  them,  or  a 
part  of  them,  onward  before  Him,  either  to  pre- 
pare for  His  subsequent  coming,  or  because  it  was 
His  pleasure  to  go,  after  them,  alone.  Now,  how- 
ever, all  this  was  changed.  He  was  to  go  before 
them  into  Galilee,  and  they  were  to  follow  Him 


In  the  Footsteps  of  Jesus        165 

thither,  but  it  was  not  as  a  visible  presence  moving 
among  them.  They  could  not  keep  Him  in  sight 
as  they  made  the  long  journey.  The  path  He  took 
they  could  not  take.  In  other  words,  they  were 
now  to  begin  to  walk  by  faith,  following  one  whom 
they  could  not  see.  Nowhere,  as  they  went  along, 
could  they  catch  sight  of  Him.  His  blessed  feet 
were  unstained  by  contact  with  the  Judean  roads 
and  left  no  print  upon  them.  He  passed  unseen 
among  the  throngs  of  Passover  pilgrims  who  were 
returning  northward  to  their  homes,  bearing  the 
tidings  of  the  strange  events  which  had  made  the 
days  just  past  so  tragic  and  so  memorable.  And 
the  disciples  were  bidden  to  follow  Him  in  the  be- 
lief that  though  they  could  not  perceive  Him,  as 
they  pursued  their  way,  He  would  fulfill  His  prom- 
ise and  manifest  Himself  to  them  when  the  familiar 
hills  of  Galilee  were  once  more  beneath  their  feet. 

Now  the  special  thought  suggested  by  this  is  that 
our  blessed  Master  has  gone  and  is  still  going  be- 
fore us  along  the  paths  which  we  are  called  to  take 
in  life.  We  cannot,  indeed,  behold  Him  now,  but 
over  every  step  of  the  way  in  which  we  are  mov- 
ing onward,  He  has  really  passed,  and  we  shall  see 
Him  by  and  by,  when  we  reach  our  journey's  end. 
There  is  certainly  great  encouragement  and  comfort 
in  the  fact,  when  the  way  seems,  as  it  so  often  does, 
lonely  and  wearisome. 

The  journey  of  life  !  There  is  something  very 
impressive  in  the  thought  of  it,  when  one  reflects 


166  Life  Indeed 

upon  all  that  is  involved  in  it,  and  traces  it  from  its 
beginning  to  its  remote  and  unknown  end.  What 
a  mysterious,  winding  way  it  is,  through  desert  and 
forest,  over  delectable  mountains,  perhaps,  and  per- 
haps across  rude  and  stormy  seas,  through  mist  and 
darkness  very  often,  and  sometimes  through  bright, 
exhilarating  airs, — a  narrow  way,  with  pitfalls  and 
precipices  on  every  hand,  and  the  end  coming  no 
nearer,  because  it  never  ends  !  It  is  "  a  path  which 
no  bird  knoweth,  and  which  the  vulture's  eye  hath 
not  seen," — that  over  which  the  soul  of  every  man 
is  called  to  move,  rising  higher  and  higher  toward 
the  heavenly  hills,  or  leading  downward  into  dark 
and  dreary  realms  of  spiritual  desolation  and  death. 
Well  may  we  sometimes  feel  dismayed,  as  we  sur- 
vey it,  and  ask  ourselves.  Is  life  a  blessing  after  all  ? 
How  shall  our  souls  be  made  competent  to  bear  the 
tremendous  burden  of  their  own  destinies?  Who 
shall  guide  us  so  that  we  shall  not  stray  ?  Who 
shall  keep  our  weak  and  timid  feet  steadfast  in  the 
right  path  ? 

It  is  a  great  question — the  greatest  of  questions 
for  a  thoughtful  mind,  looking  out  upon  the  world 
into  which  it  finds  itself  flung  by  an  unseen  and  ir- 
resistible power.  And  the  most  cheering  answer 
that  can  be  given  to  it  is  in  the  words,  ''  He  goeth 
before  you;  follow  Him." 

Let  me  remind  you,  in  the  first  place,  that  the 
Lord  Jesus  Christ  has  gone  before  us  through  the 
round  of  daily  cares  and  duties  in  which  so  much 


In  the  Footsteps  of  Jesus        167 

of  life  consists.  It  was  not  for  nothing  that  He 
was  born  into  the  home  of  the  Nazarene  carpenter, 
and  lived  there  quietly  and  unknown  for  thirty 
years.  They  were  years  of  ripening  and  of  prepa- 
ration, and  the  sacred  record  passes  them  in  silence. 
We  sometimes  lose  sight  of  them,  while  we  fix  our 
attention  upon  the  short  but  crowded  ministry  that 
followed  them.  And  yet  I  think  that  in  some  re- 
spects they  bring  Him,  who  is  our  divine  example 
as  well  as  our  divine  Redeemer,  nearer  to  us,  than 
the  few  months  of  public  activity  which  were  so 
resplendent  with  teaching  and  miracle,  and  which 
ended  at  the  cross.  For  our  life  is  made  up  (is  it 
not  ?)  of  homely  duties  and  of  little  things.  We 
fill  no  public  stations.  We  are  not  called  to  be 
apostles.  Our  sphere  is  narrow,  our  opportunities 
are  few.  Our  years  are  all  silent  years ;  and  it  is 
here,  in  the  dull  routine  of  events  that  make  no 
stir,  and  of  work  that  comes  to  nothing  great — it  is 
here,  if  it  is  anywhere,  that  we  need  the  power  of 
an  inspiring  example  and  the  assurance  of  a  divine 
sympathy  and  aid.  And  precisely  here  it  is  that 
we  may  be  daily  following  Jesus,  for  He  has  gone 
through  all  this  before  us.  For  thirty  years  the 
sun  rose  and  set  every  day  upon  that  Galilean  vil- 
lage, and  it  saw  no  splendor  of  miracle  surrounding 
Him  who  was  by  and  by  to  catch  the  tempest  on 
His  word  and  send  it  back  to  the  caverns  out  of 
which  it  had  come  forth.  It  saw  only  a  gentle, 
faithful,  patient  human  life,  employed  in  such  tasks 


168  Life  Indeed 

as  others  were  engaged  in — the  lowly  labor  of  a 
small  mountain  town.  There  can  be  in  your  daily 
life  or  mine  no  humbler  or  homelier  duties  than 
those  which  for  so  many  years  engaged  the  daily 
thought  and  care  of  Him  who  was  at  once  the  Son 
of  Man  and  the  Son  of  God.  The  weariness  from 
which  we  so  often  suffer,  the  consciousness  of  pow- 
ers unemployed  or  only  half  employed,  the  restless- 
ness that  torments  us  under  the  limitations  by  which 
we  are  hedged  in,  do  you  not  suppose  that  He  also 
knew  them,  as  the  uneventful  years  moved  round, 
and  the  sense  of  His  great  mission  burned  more 
and  more  brightly  in  His  soul  ?  Think  of  it,  when 
you  are  inclined  to  fret  under  the  duties  which 
every  day  requires  of  you,  and  the  burdens  which 
the  night,  even,  does  not  lift  from  your  heart.  You 
are  simply  walking  in  the  path  in  which  the  Lord 
has  gone  before. 

But  our  lives  have  their  crises  also,  their  great 
decisive  experiences,  when  important  interests  de- 
pend upon  the  decision  of  a  moment,  when  our 
own  fate  or  the  fate  of  others  hangs  on  our  action 
or  on  our  failure  to  act.  At  such  a  time  the  bur- 
den of  responsibility  or  anxiety  which  is  upon  us 
may  be  almost  overwhelming,  and  the  contents  of 
many  years  may  be  crowded  into  a  few  hours. 
Measure  life  not  by  its  duration  but  by  its  intensity, 
and  many  a  young  man  has  outlived  whole  genera- 
tions. These  are  the  experiences  which  test  men, 
coming  when  they  are  not  looked  for,  and  lifting 


In  the  Footsteps  of  Jesus        169 

one  into  heroism  or  dashing  character  and  reputa- 
tion into  irretrievable  ruin.  They  came  to  Jesus 
also,  and  you  know  how  He  met  them :  calmly, 
bravely,  with  His  heart  resting  upon  God,  with 
His  eye  fixed  upon  the  future.  I  do  not  say  that 
to  Him  they  were  unforseen,  as  they  so  often  are 
to  us.  But  there  was  in  Him  an  energy  of  faith,  a 
resoluteness  of  purpose,  which  is  a  better  safeguard 
in  moments  of  suspense  than  any  power  to  antici- 
pate that  which  is  to  come.  This  power  does  not 
belong  to  us.  The  other  may  be  ours.  No  man 
can  tell  when  the  emergency  may  be  upon  him,  or 
what  its  issue  is  to  be.  But  there  can  certainly 
come  to  us  no  trials  of  faith  or  constancy  or  cour- 
age or  meek  endurance  which  are  worthy  to  be 
compared  with  those  through  which  the  Lord  has 
gone  before  us.  If  He  walked  on  the  loftiest 
heights  of  human  life,  He  also  sounded  its  deepest 
depths.  His  human  nature  was  not  more  perfect 
than  His  human  experience,  passing  from  that 
which  is  lowliest  to  that  which  is  grandest  both  in 
achievement  and  in  endurance.  If  He  asks  us  to 
follow  Him  in  the  one.  He  asks  us  only  to  follow 
Him  in  the  other. 

So,  too,  He  has  gone  before  us  in  the  conflict 
with  temptation.  Yes,  He  condescended  even  to 
that.  One  might  have  expected  that  if  God  was 
to  come  into  the  world,  making  His  glory  visible 
to  mortal  eyes,  it  would  be  in  such  a  way  that  evil 
would  flee  away  before  Him,  as  darkness  vanishes 


170  Life  Indeed 

before  the  sun.  How  could  it  be  possible  for  Him 
to  feel  its  fierce  and  deadly  assault  ?  How  could 
it  seize  Him  with  a  grip  so  strong  that  it  required 
an  almost  superhuman  effort  to  shake  it  off?  It 
was  possible  only  because  He  took  our  nature  upon 
Him  so  completely,  even  to  its  capacity  of  being 
tempted  to  sin.  He  did  not  sin.  He  conquered 
where  we  are  all  beaten.  But  He  knew  the  tre- 
mendous strain  which  we  all  know  so  well.  Not 
once  only,  as  we  are  apt  to  imagine  when  we  read 
or  speak  of  The  Temptation,  but  through  all  His 
life  He  carried  on  the  conflict,  in  which  we  too  are 
all  the  while  engaged.  Here  is  the  explanation  of 
the  nights  spent  in  prayer  upon  the  mountains. 
Here  is  the  secret  of  the  m)'sterious  scene  in  the 
shadow  of  the  olives  of  Gethsemane.  And  if  we 
would  estimate  the  strength  of  the  temptations 
which  He  endured,  we  must  measure  the  malignity 
of  the  powers  of  darkness,  toward  one  who  seemed 
about  to  overcome  them,  and  who  did  overcome 
them  and  break  their  reign  on  earth.  But  you,  O 
tempted  soul,  who  are  trying  hard  to  stand  your 
ground  against  the  same  principalities  and  powers 
of  e\'il,  and  who  are  bruised  and  wounded  in  the 
tremendous  struggle — remember  that  even  the  Son 
of  God  has  gone  before  you  through  the  same  life- 
long battle;  that  even  for  Him  it  was  not  wholly 
ended  till  He  cried,  *'It  is  finished,"  and  breathed 
out  His  spirit  into  the  hands  of  God.  Remember 
that  He  who  has  now  become  our  high-priest  for- 


In  the  Footsteps  of  Jesus        171 

ever,  is  still  touched  with  the  sense  of  our  infirmi- 
ties, because  He  was  tempted  in  all  points  as  we 
are  now  tempted  every  day. 

You  will  certainly  anticipate  me  in  thinking  of 
sorrow,  as  another  of  the  universal  experiences  of 
life  through  which  the  Lord  has  gone  before  us. 
There  are  elements  of  sorrow  which  He  cannot 
have  known  by  any  actual  experience  of  them. 
He  who  made  no  mistake,  and  who  committed  no 
sin,  can  have  felt  no  self-reproach.  He  preached 
repentance  to  others,  but  He  had  Himself  nothing 
to  repent  of.  The  sorrow  that  springs  from  the 
sense  of  shame,  He  often  witnessed,  but  He  did 
not  feel  it.  Or  rather.  He  did  feel  it  all,  just  as 
He  felt  the  weight  of  sins  which  He  had  not  com- 
mitted, because  by  His  divine  sympathy  He  entered 
so  perfectly  into  the  actual  life  of  humanity  and 
made  it  all  His  own.  It  was  not  the  burden  of  His 
own  guilt,  but  of  the  world's  guilt,  which  crushed 
Him  in  the  garden  and  on  the  cross,  and  He  has 
borne  on  His  strong  and  loving  heart  the  burden 
of  the  whole  world's  sorrow.  He  has  gone  before 
you,  O  sad  and  suffering  heart,  through  the  valley 
of  tears  in  whose  deep  shadows  you  are  walking, 
and  you  are  only  following  Him.  We  sometimes 
look,  in  the  midst  of  our  grief  and  desolation,  for 
something  just  like  it  in  the  life  of  our  Lord,  and 
we  say,  *'How  can  He  know  precisely  my  sorrow, 
when  His  experience  was  so  different  from  mine?  " 
Ah  !  it  is  not  that.     Your  experience  is  His,  be- 


172  Life  Indeed 

cause  His  infinite  nature  comprehends  yours,  as  the 
ocean  comprehends  each  several  drop  in  the  vast 
volume  of  its  waters.  And  not  only  sorrow  like 
yours,  but  your  very  sorrow — He  has  taken  it  upon 
Himself,  in  His  divine  compassion  and  love.  Go 
forward,  then,  with  patient  steps,  saying : 

"  Not  as  I  will,"  because  the  One 
Who  loved  us  first  and  best  has  gone 
Before  us  on  the  road,  and  still 
For  us  must  all  His  love  fulfill, 

"  Not  as  we  will." 

And  then,  not  through  life  alone  are  we  literally 
to  follow  Christ — through  its  more  common  and 
more  critical  experiences,  its  conflicts  with  tempta- 
tion, its  endurance  of  sorrow;  He  has  also  gone 
before  us  through  death.  Through  death — it  is 
His  resurrection  which  has  taught  us  to  use  these 
words.  Into  death,  the  world  has  said  before. 
Generation  after  generation  had  gone  down  into 
the  grave,  as  shattered  ships  go  down  into  the  sea, 
and  it  had  closed  over  them,  and  all  was  still  again. 
It  was  an  insatiable  and  a  bottomless  abyss.  What 
was  beyond  it  ?  Was  anything  beyond  it  ?  Who 
could  say?  Into  that  silence  and  that  darkness 
the  Lord  of  life  and  light  descended.  He  also 
was  laid  in  the  tomb,  and  they  rolled  a  great  stone 
to  the  door  of  the  sepulchre  and  sealed  it  and  left 
it.  But  that  was  not  the  end.  There  is  something 
beyond  the  grave,  and  out  of  the  shadowy  world — 


In  the  Footsteps  of  Jesus         173 

shadowy  only  because  our  sight  is  so  dim — He 
who  had  gone  thither  before  us  comes  back  and 
speaks  to  us  again.  He  does  not  promise  to  us  or 
to  any  of  us  immunity  from  physical  death.  That 
is  not  a  curse,  it  is  a  blessing.  It  is  rest  for  the 
weary  hand  and  brain  and  heart.  It  is  freedom 
for  the  imprisoned  soul.  But  He  says  to  us,  *'  I 
have  gone  before  you  through  it;  follow  Me." 
**  He  that  believeth  on  Me  shall  never  really  die." 
So  it  is  that  the  darkest  of  all  paths  is  brightened, 
and  the  deepest  of  all  mysteries  dispelled.  We 
need  not  fear  to  follow  where  He  has  passed. 
What  if  the  way  is  lonely  when  it  goes  out  beyond 
the  little  space  over  which  our  vision  ranges? 
What  if  we  shrink  with  natural  recoil  from  new 
and  untried  conditions  of  existence  ?  Lo,  He  has 
gone  before  us  through  the  grave  itself.  And  for 
us  to  die  is  but  to  follow  Him. 

''There  shall  ye  see  Him,"  added  the  angel, 
''as  He  Himself  said  unto  you."  And  the  prom- 
ise was  fulfilled.  They  did  not  find  Him  where 
they  sought  Him,  in  the  sepulchre ;  but  among  the 
hills  of  Galilee,  on  the  shore  of  the  lake  where 
they  had  so  often  walked  together.  He  made 
Himself  visible  to  them  again.  It  is  an  inspiring 
prophecy  and  promise  to  all  who  follow  Him  in 
faith.  It  is  no  sign  that  He  is  not  near  us  that  we 
cannot  behold  Him  now.  But  the  perfect  and  re- 
warding vision  of  the  Lord  will  not  be  ours  till  we 
have  gained  the  heavenly  hills,  and  looked   forth 


IT-i  Life  Indeed 

upon  the  crystal  sea.  There  at  last  the  way  will 
end,  and  we  shall  be  with  Him  forever.  It  was, 
after  all,  only  a  vanishing  glimpse  of  the  Master 
which  rewarded  the  obedient  faith  of  the  disciples. 
The  presence,  which  was  manifested  to  them,  was 
soon  again  taken  from  them,  and  they  were  left  to 
walk  once  more  by  faith.  But  there  will  be  no 
further  separation  from  Him  for  those  who  have 
followed  Him  into  the  other  world.  There  at  last 
we  shall  behold  Him  as  He  is,  and  the  great  re- 
ward of  all  our  earthly  struggle,  the  final  fruition 
of  our  hopes,  the  full  satisfaction  of  our  souls, 
which  this  world  can  never  yield,  will  be  attained, 
when  we  shall  there  be  with  Him  forever. 

But  now  in  speaking  thus  of  the  way  over  which 
our  Lord  has  passed  before  us,  through  life  and 
through  death,  I  would  not  forget,  or  have  you  fail 
to  remember,  the  other  thought,  which  I  suggested 
at  the  outset,  that  He  is  still  going  before  us,  and 
that  we  have  only  to  follow  Him,  through  every 
difficult  servdce  and  every  dark  path.  It  is  not 
merely  true  that  He  once  moved  across  the  earth 
on  which  we  live,  leaving  a  line  of  light  behind 
Him,  and  then  vanished  into  the  world  unseen. 
That  is  not  the  gospel  of  the  resurrection,  or  the 
great  truth  of  Christianity.  He  is  still  moving 
among  men  and  before  them,  as  when  He  then 
went  onward,  in  advance  of  the  disciples,  from 
Judea  into  Galilee.  He  goes  before  the  missionary 
of  the  cross  to  heathen  lands,  preparing  the  way 


In  the  Footsteps  of  Jesus        175 

by  which  His  servant  is  to  follow  Him,  and  open- 
ing the  path  for  the  entrance  of  the  truth  into 
darkened  minds  and  dying  souls.  He  goes  before 
the  sister  of  Christian  charity,  on  her  divine  errand 
of  love  and  pity,  to  the  abode  of  ignorance  and 
poverty,  or  the  bedside  of  disease  and  death.  He 
goes  before  every  trusting,  obedient  disciple  to  the 
spot  where  a  difficult  or  perilous  service  is  waiting 
to  be  done,  or  to  the  hour  which  is  to  call  for  some 
still  more  difficult,  still  more  heroic  endurance. 
We  cannot  see  Him,  but  we  shall  find  Him  there, 
and  His  presence  will  make  the  achievement  pos- 
sible, the  trial  light.  Ah  !  if  we  could  but  realize 
this,  how  strong  and  courageous  and  confident  it 
would  make  us  !  There  is  no  loneliness — the  most 
solitary  way  is  bright  and  peaceful — to  one  who 
knows  that  the  Lord  is  always  with  him.  There  is 
no  such  thing  as  failure  for  one  who  can  (as  it  were) 
feel  the  nearness  of  that  divine  form  which  the  eye 
cannot  discern.  Then  difficulties  seem  to  be  swept 
from  before  us,  as  the  summer  wind  sweeps  away 
the  mists  that  have  settled  upon  land  and  sea. 
Then  fear  and  doubt  are  dispelled,  as  when  after 
many  days  of  storm  the  sun  breaks  forth  again, 
and  all  the  sky  is  clear.  So  it  was  that  the  dis- 
ciples, believing  that  the  living  Lord  was  going  be- 
fore them,  went  forth,  in  the  might  of  an  invincible 
faith,  not  to  Galilee  merely,  but  to  the  ends  of  the 
earth.  The  power  by  which  they  accomplished 
their  great  work  was  not  in  themselves.     It  was  in 


176  Life  Indeed 

Him,  whom  they  obediently  and  gladly  followed, 
and  who  not  only  manifested  Himself  repeatedly 
to  them,  but  gave  them  strength  and  fortitude  and 
courage  for  the  stupendous  task  which  He  called 
them  to  undertake. 

And  here  is  also  our  hope  and  our  strength,  in 
presence  of  the  duties  and  trials  by  which  we  are 
so  constantly  confronted.  It  is  comforting  to 
remember  that  the  path  of  life  which  we  are  tread- 
ing has  once  been  trodden  by  the  Son  of  God.  It 
gives  dignity  and  beauty  to  the  lowliest  career,  and 
takes  their  terror  and  threat  from  the  greatest 
emergencies.  It  makes  temptation  easier  to  face, 
and  sorrow  lighter  to  endure.  The  power  to  meet 
even  death  without  shrinking,  comes  to  us  from  the 
knowledge  that  He  has  passed  through  it  into  a 
larger  and  more  glorious  life ;  and  it  is  the  glory  of 
heaven  itself  that  He — the  Lord — awaits  us  there. 
But  sweeter  still  to  those  who  are  weary  and  worn 
with  the  toil  and  conflict  of  life — sweeter  and  more 
inspiriting  still,  is  the  divine  assurance  of  Him 
whom  the  grave  could  not  detain,  "Lo,  I  am  with 
you  always,"  or,  more  exactly,  "all  the  days," — 
with  you  everyday, — ''till  the  world  shall  end." 
He  will  go  before  you  in  a  few  moments,  to  your 
homes,  and  there  He  will  be  with  you.  He  will 
go  before  you  to-morrow  to  your  business,  and 
there,  too,  He  will  be  with  you.  He  will  see  you, 
though  you  may  not  see  Him.  He  will  hear  you, 
as  you  speak  to  Him,  though  you  speak  to  Him  in 


In  the  Footsteps  of  Jesus        1T7 

the  softest  whisper,  or  only  in  your  thought.  He 
will  not  leave  you,  even  if  you  forget  Him,  and 
wherever  He  may  send  you.  He  Himself  will  go 
before. 

All  unseen  the  Master  walketh 

By  the  toiling  servant's  side ; 
Comfortable  words  He  speaketh. 

While  His  hands  uphold  and  guide. 

Grief  nor  pain  nor  any  sorrow 

Rends  thy  heart,  to  Him  unknown ; 

He  to-day,  and  He  to-morrow, 
Grace  sufficient  gives  His  own. 

Holy  strivings  nerve  and  strengthen ; 

Long  endurance  wins  the  crown ; 
When  the  evening  shadows  lengthen, 

Thou  shalt  lay  thy  burden  down. 

O  the  comfort  and  the  glory  of  walking  thus 
after  the  unseen  Lord  !  O  the  glory,  greater  still,  of 
walking  with  Him  by  and  by,  in  the  light  and  peace 
and  joy  of  Paradise  ! 


JESUS  ASLEEP 


And  He  was  in  the  hinder  part  of  the  shipy 
asleep  on  a  pillow.  And  they  aivake  Him,  and 
say  iiiito  Him,  Master,  car  est  Thou  not  that  we 
perish  ? — Mark  iv.  38. 


JESUS  ASLEEP 

It  had  been  a  busy  day  in  the  Hfe  of  our  Lord. 
For  many  hours  He  had  been  teaching  on  the 
shore  of  the  lake,  and  the  multitude  which  gathered 
to  hear  Him  was  so  great  that  He  had  at  last 
stepped  into  a  little  boat,  and  making  that  His 
pulpit,  had  spoken  from  it  to  the  crowds  which 
lined  the  beach.  Parable  after  parable  of  extra- 
ordinary beauty  and  power  had  fallen  from  His 
lips.  No  doubt,  in  the  course  of  the  day  He  had 
wrought  many  miracles  of  healing.  At  last,  toward 
evening.  He  said  to  His  disciples,  ''Let  us  cross 
over  to  the  other  side."  Accordingly  they  dis- 
missed the  multitude,  took  Him  as  He  was  in  their 
small  fishing-boat,  and  accompanied  by  many  other 
boats  of  the  same  kind,  set  sail  to  cross  the  lake. 
It  was  only  some  six  miles  wide,  and  in  an  hour  or 
so  they  should  easily  have  reached  its  eastern 
shore.  But  a  sudden  squall  came  up,  with  the 
rapidity  and  violence  with  which  such  changes  in 
the  weather  often  occur  on  lakes  that  are  embosomed 
in  the  hills.  The  skies  grew  dark,  the  waters  be- 
came boisterous,  the  boat  became  unmanageable; 
it  was  rapidly  filling,  and  seemed  to  be  on  the 
point  of  going  down.  And  Jesus  was  asleep. 
181 


182  Life  Indeed 

It  was  the  sleep  of  weariness.  He  was  a  man, 
and  like  many  another  man  was  tired  out  with  His 
long  day's  work.  The  physical  limitations  and 
infirmities  with  which  we  are  all  acquainted,  were 
no  less  familiar  to  Him.  He  was  exhausted  by  the 
mental  tension  and  strain,  involved  in  continuous 
teaching  during  so  many  hours.  Not  without  a 
conscious  drain  upon  His  physical  strength,  as 
other  circumstances  indicate,  did  He  perform  His 
miraculous  cures.  And  heavier  still  was  the 
burden  of  sympathy  resting  upon  His  heart,  as  He 
observed  the  sad  spiritual  state  of  the  men  and 
women  around  Him,  whom  He  compared  to  sheep 
without  a  shepherd,  to  lost  children  who  had 
wandered  far  from  their  Father's  house.  It  evi- 
dently cost  Him  something,  more,  doubtless,  than 
we  always  realize,  to  do  His  daily  work;  and 
greater  far  than  the  physical  fatigue  or  the  mental 
effort  involved  in  it,  must  have  been  the  stress  of 
feeling  under  which  He  lived,  through  all  His 
public  ministry.  He  must  indeed  have  been 
thoroughly  worn  out,  to  have  been  able  to  sleep  in 
such  a  storm. 

It  was  also  the  sleep  of  innocence.  In  such  an 
hour  of  obvious  peril,  one  who  is  troubled  by  a 
guilty  conscience  cannot  sleep.  Have  you  never 
gone  to  your  rest,  when  the  day's  work  was  done 
and  everything  was  quiet  around  you,  and  then 
been  kept  wide  awake,  hour  after  hour,  by  thoughts 
of  the  mistakes  you  had  made,  or  the  sins  you  had 


Jesus  Asleep  183 

committed  during  the  day  ?  Have  you  not  some- 
times even  been  roused  out  of  a  restful  slumber  by 
the  memory  of  some  act  of  folly  or  of  wickedness, 
which  you  perpetrated  many  days  or  weeks  or 
years  ago,  and  found  yourself  unable  to  expel  it 
from  your  thoughts  and  go  quietly  to  sleep  again  ? 
Have  you  never  lain  awake  through  some  wild 
night  at  sea,  when  the  great,  strong  ship  was  roll- 
ing heavily  in  the  tumultuous  waves,  and  wondered 
what  would  become  of  you,  if  anything  should  give 
way  and  the  brave  vessel  should  go  down  ?  Jesus 
never  made  a  mistake.  He  never  committed  a 
sin.  He  never  neglected  or  turned  aside  from  a 
duty.  There  was  nothing  to  cause  Him  self-re- 
proach, His  conscience  was  always  perfectly  clear. 
And  therefore  He  could  sleep  even  amidst  the  fury 
of  the  storm. 

And  then  again,  it  was  the  sleep  of  confidence. 
Who  of  us  has  not  seen  a  little  child  falling  asleep 
in  the  arms  of  its  mother,  with  a  look  of  perfect 
content  and  perfect  trust  on  its  pure  face,  lifting  its 
little  hands  in  a  silent  caress  as  the  eyelids  closed, 
and  then  resting,  no  matter  what  turmoil  or  peril 
might  surround  it,  without  a  motion  or  a  sound, 
absolutely  secure,  absolutely  peaceful  ?  So  Jesus 
slept,  on  that  stormy  night,  in  the  open  boat,  amid 
the  howling  waters,  under  the  pelting  rain,  no 
doubt,  and  through  the  wild  raging  of  the  wind, 
trustfully  confiding  in  His  Father's  care. 

Now   look   at    the    disciples.     They   were    not 


184  Life  Indeed 

asleep.  They  had  no  business  to  be  asleep.  They 
were  toiling  with  all  their  might.  They  were 
stoutly  battling  against  wind  and  sea,  striving  to 
keep  their  little  boat  from  being  driven  from  its 
course  or  capsized  or  carried  down.  But  they 
were  terribly  frightened;  and  the  whole  story 
shows  that  they  had  good  reason  to  be  frightened. 
They  were  not  timid  men.  They  were  not  unused 
to  such  an  experience.  They  were  stout  and 
hardy  fishermen.  They  had  lived  for  years  on 
these  treacherous  waters.  They  had  been  caught 
before  in  many  a  storm.  But  never,  it  would 
seem,  had  they  felt  themselves  to  be  in  greater 
peril.  They  had  done  all  that  strong  men  could 
do,  but  they  evidently  thought  that  their  last  hour 
had  come.  They  were  looking  death  directly  in 
the  face.  And  then  it  occurred  to  them  to  do 
what  we  cannot  help  wondering  that  they  had  not 
done  before, — it  occurred  to  them  to  wake  the 
Master.  But  they  awoke  Him  with  a  strange  ques- 
tion. They  did  not  call  upon  Him  to  prepare  to 
die,  or  if  possible  to  try  to  save  Himself.  They 
asked  Him,  reproachfully,  almost  angrily,  as  it 
would  seem,  "  Carest  Thou  not  that  we  perish?  " 

The  answer  of  Jesus  was  still  more  surprising. 
"Where  is  your  faith?"  He  said,  or,  as  another 
account  of  the  incident  reads,  "  How  is  it  that  ye 
have  no  faith?"  That,  then,  was  the  trouble. 
They  had  skill  enough,  they  had  strength  enough, 
they  had  courage  enough,  but  they  ought  to  have 


Jesus  Asleep  185 

had  more  confidence,  not  in  Him  only,  but  in 
God.  Even  at  that  moment  of  excitement  and 
danger,  they  ought  to  have  remembered  that  they 
were  in  no  real  danger.  They  should  have  re- 
membered that  it  could  not  be  God's  will  that  He 
and  they  should  perish  on  that  stormy  night,  in 
the  dark  waters  of  the  Lake  of  Galilee.  It  was 
not  for  this  that  He  had  come  into  the  world,  leav- 
ing His  heavenly  glory  and  entering  into  human 
life.  It  was  not  for  this  that  He  had  undertaken 
the  work  which  His  Father  had  given  Him  to  do. 
It  was  not  for  this  that  He  had  called  them  to  be- 
come His  disciples,  and  had  begun  to  train  them 
also  for  their  work.  So  long  as  that  work  was  un- 
finished, they  were  safe.  They  ought  to  have 
known  that  God  would  preserve  them  amidst  all 
such  dangers  as  those  which  now  threatened  them, 
until  it  was  accomplished.  If  their  address  to 
Him  was  reproachful,  His  reply  to  it  was  much 
more  so,  and  with  far  better  reason.  Their  abject 
terror  was  due  to  their  lack  of  faith,  not  in  them- 
selves, but  in  Him,  and  in  God  who  had  sent  Him. 
It  was  due  to  the  fact  that  they  had  not  yet 
grasped,  as  they  ought  to  have  done,  and  as  they 
did  afterward,  the  nature  of  His  mission,  that  they 
did  not  appreciate  the  importance  of  His  work, 
that  they  did  not  remember  that  no  accident  can 
ever  arrest  the  plans  of  God,  or  imperil  the  lives  of 
those  to  whose  care  they  are  entrusted.  It  was 
early  in  their  intercourse  with  Jesus  that  this  inci- 


186  Life  Indeed 

dent  occurred,  and  it  is  not  perhaps  surprising  that 
they  had  not  yet  learned  to  trust  Him  with  that 
entire  confidence  which  they  afterward  acquired, 
or  to  trust  in  God  with  that  entire  self-surrender 
and  composure  of  which  He  gave  them  so  sublime 
an  example.  But  it  was  of  the  utmost  importance 
that  they  should  learn  this  lesson,  and  that  was,  no 
doubt,  the  simple  reason  why  this  fierce  storm  was 
let  loose  upon  them,  and  they  were  made  to  feel 
that  there  was  nothing  else  for  them  to  do  but  trust 
in  God.  Then  the  stars  shone  out  once  more,  and 
all  was  safe  and  quiet.  When  the  thrilling  expe- 
rience had  done  its  work,  the  winds  might  be 
locked  up  again  in  the  caverns  of  the  hills  by  the 
word  of  His  power,  and  a  great  calm  be  spread 
over  land  and  sea. 

And  yet  you  will  observe  that  the  anxious  and 
toil-worn  disciples  were  not  wholly  without  faith. 
They  had  faith  enough  to  go  to  Christ  and  ask  His 
help.  And  it  is  a  striking  evidence  of  the  extent 
to  which  they  had  already  learned  to  confide  in 
His  supernatural  power.  So  far  as  the  narrative 
shows,  they  had  yet  seen  no  miracle  like  that  which 
they  were  soon  to  witness.  They  had  seen  Him 
change  the  water  into  wine,  they  had  seen  Him 
heal  with  a  word  or  a  touch  many  forms  of  disease ; 
but  they  had  as  yet  had  no  proof  of  His  power 
over  the  mighty  energies  of  nature,  so  that  even 
the  winds  and  the  waves  were  obedient  to  Him. 
And  yet  when  they  found  themselves  in  this  des- 


Jesus  Asleep  187 

perate  peril,  they  not  only  woke  Him  with  their 
cry  of  distress,  but  their  language,  as  it  is  re- 
corded for  us,  shows  their  faith  that  He  had  the 
power  to  save  them  if  He  would.  How  He  would 
manifest  that  power,  of  course  th^y  did  not  know, 
but  they  had  already  seen  so  much  of  Him  that 
they  had  come  apparently  to  feel  that  He  could  do 
anything  that  He  might  choose  to  do.  And  so 
they  went  to  Him  and  awoke  Him  and  appealed  to 
Him  for  help.  Faith  enough  for  that  they  had  ! 
And  it  was  not  disappointed.  He  rose  from  the 
pillow  on  which  He  had  been  sleeping,  and  with  a 
majesty  which  we  can  perhaps  imagine  but  cannot 
describe,  He  rebuked  the  winds ;  the  waves  sub- 
sided, and  in  a  few  moments  the  little  boat  had 
reached  the  land. 

Now  the  lessons  which  we  may  learn  from  this 
most  picturesque  and  striking  incident  are  obvious 
enough,  but  it  is  good  for  us  to  set  them  frequently 
and  distinctly  before  our  minds.  What  then  took 
place  on  the  sea  of  Tiberias,  has  often  been  re- 
peated in  the  history  of  Christ's  people.  Life  is 
not  all  plain  sailing,  over  smooth  waters,  under 
cloudless  skies.  Far  from  it.  There  are  none  of 
us  over  whom  storms  do  not  sometimes  gather, 
none  of  us  who  do  not  sometimes  find  ourselves 
rudely  tossed  on  troubled  waves.  We  are  battling, 
perhaps,  against  what  we  call  adverse  circumstances. 
The  outward  conditions  of  our  life  are  such  as  to 
hinder  us  from  doing  what  we  would,  as  to  con- 


188  Life  Indeed 

demn  us  to  exhausting  and  apparently  vain  exer- 
tions, as  to  imperil  our  success  and  perhaps  our 
safety.  We  have  to  struggle  against  poverty,  for 
example,  against  the  disadvantages  of  early  life, 
against  repeated  disappointment,  against  ill  health, 
against  bereavement  and  sorrow,  against  the  op- 
position or  the  indifference  or  the  treachery  of  our 
fellow-men.  Year  by  year,  it  may  be,  we  have  kept 
up  the  strenuous  but  ill-rewarded  struggle,  and 
whichever  way  we  have  turned  we  have  found  our- 
selves baffled  and  beaten  back,  until  heart  and  hope 
have  almost  gone  out  of  us.  The  mighty  and  un- 
governed  forces  of  life  seem  to  have  us  at  their 
mercy ;  and  it  looks  as  if  the  waves  would  close 
over  us  before  very  long,  and  we  should  simply 
disappear  and  be  forgotten.  On  the  broad  and 
stormy  sea  of  Hfe  how  many  little  boats,  freighted 
with  eager  hopes  and  high  ambitions  and  vast  pos- 
sibilities of  activity  and  happiness,  are  driving  or 
drifting  helplessly  along,  out  of  their  true  course, 
under  no  firm  control,  at  the  mercy  of  the  waves, 
and  ready  to  perish  ! 

Or  again,  the  turmoil  and  the  peril  are  not  with- 
out but  within.  They  do  not  arise  from  the  cir- 
cumstances in  which  we  are  placed,  or  the  condi- 
tions in  which  we  are  living  ;  but  we  are  buffeted  by 
doubts  and  fears  ;  we  are  driven  on  by  uncontrolla- 
ble passions ;  our  own  consciences  have  made  cow- 
ards of  us  and  robbed  us  of  our  moral  strength. 
Truths  which  once  shone  like  clear  stars  upon  our 


Jesus  Asleep  189 

minds,  are  now  hidden  by  clouds  of  uncertainty  or 
unbelief.  We  have  lost  our  reckoning.  We  have  been 
driven  out  of  our  course.  Chart  and  compass  have 
been  lost,  or  have  become  useless.  We  are  stagger- 
ing on  blindly  and  helplessly,  and  nothing  short  of  a 
miracle  can  save  us  from  making  shipwreck  of  our 
faith,  perhaps  even  of  our  characters  and  lives. 
You  know  what  I  mean.  You  have  yourselves, 
very  likely,  passed  through  such  experiences. 
Some  of  you  may  perhaps  be  in  this  sad  case  to- 
day, or,  if  you  are  not,  many  other  people  are.  It 
is  not  an  unusual  thing,  even  in  these  days  of  light 
and  peace  and  prosperity  and  progress,  for  a  human 
soul,  even  for  a  Christian  soul,  to  be  in  as  desperate 
a  plight  as  the  disciples  in  that  little  Galilean  fish- 
ing-boat in  which  Jesus  lay  asleep. 

And  so  too  it  often  has  been  with  the  Church. 
The  Christian  Church,  which  has  since  grown  to 
such  vast  proportions,  which  has  accomplished  such 
a  marvelous  work,  with  which  the  hopes  of  humanity 
for  the  future  are  so  closely  identified — it  was  all  in 
that  boat,  on  that  critical  night,  with  Jesus  and  His 
friends.  We  sometimes  say,  and  say  truly,  that 
the  destinies  of  half  the  human  race  were  in  the 
little  caravel  which  brought  Columbus  to  the  shores 
of  the  new  world.  We  say  that  the  germs  of  the 
great  republic,  which  seems,  whether  we  will  or 
not,  likely  to  expand  into  a  great  empire,  not 
merely  controlling  this  continent,  but  making  its  in- 
fluence felt  all  over  the  world,  were  in  the  little 


190  Life  Indeed 

cabin  of  the  Mayflower,  as  it  lay,  after  its  rough 
wintry  voyage,  in  the  ice-bound  harbor  of  Plymouth. 
If  so,  what  vastly  greater  interests  were  at  stake 
when  the  little  bark  that  carried  the  Christ  and 
His  chosen  disciples  was  caught  in  the  sudden 
storm,  half-way  across  the  lake  of  Galilee !  And 
if  the  Church  of  God,  freighted  with  such  incal- 
culable blessings  for  the  human  race,  escaped  that 
peril,  it  was  only  to  meet  many  another  not  less 
critical,  from  which  only  the  power  of  God  Him- 
self has  seemed  able  to  save  it.  It  has  been 
threatened  by  the  ever-repeated  assaults  of  unbe- 
lief in  a  thousand  different  forms.  It  has  seemed 
more  than  once  on  the  point  of  being  crushed  by  a 
hostile  secular  power.  It  has  been  the  prey  of  in- 
ternal corruption ;  it  has  been  disturbed  and  rent 
asunder  by  the  dissensions  of  its  own  members, 
who  instead  of  joining  hands  in  the  endeavor  to 
advance  its  influence  in  the  world,  have  turned 
upon  each  other  in  the  spirit  of  jealousy  and  hatred. 
And  more  than  all,  it  has  in  every  age,  and  never 
more  than  at  the  present  moment,  been  in  danger 
of  becoming  engulfed  in  the  swelling  floods  of 
worldliness,  by  which  it  is  surrounded.  And  it  is 
no  new  thing  for  those  who  love  the  Church  of 
Christ,  who  believe  that  the  truth  is  committed  to 
its  keeping,  that  the  most  precious  interests,  not  of 
individual  souls  only  but  of  human  civilization, 
depend  upon  its  purity  and  permanence  and  prog- 
ress, that  God  has  designed  it  and  intends  to  use 


Jesus  Asleep  191 

it  for  the  final  and  complete  redemption  of  man- 
kind— I  say  it  is  not  an  unusual  thing  for  us  to  be 
from  time  to  time  discouraged  and  dismayed  in 
view  of  the  perils  by  which  the  Church  is  threat- 
ened. It  does  not  seem  possible  for  it  to  stand  up 
against  its  external  and  its  internal  enemies.  It 
seems  as  if  it  must  be,  if  not  shattered  by  the  as- 
saults of  unbelief,  at  least  weakened  and  disin- 
tegrated by  the  insidious  power  of  error  and  of 
worldliness,  until  at  last  it  goes  to  pieces  like  some 
stout  ship  which  the  sea  has  finally  conquered  and 
carried  down  into  its  dark  and  silent  depths. 

Now  if  ever  we  find  ourselves  in  such  a  case,  or 
if  we  are  troubled  by  anxieties  like  these  in  regard 
to  the  future  of  the  Church,  it  is  well  for  us  to  re- 
member two  or  three  things  which  the  incident  be- 
fore us  distinctly  and  forcibly  suggests.  One  of 
them  is  that  every  life  is  safe  which  has  Jesus  in  it. 
And  it  is  your  privilege  and  mine  so  to  associate 
ourselves  with  Him  that  His  life  and  ours  are 
really  one  life,  and  that  each  of  us  may  say,  as  St. 
Paul  said,  "  I  live,  yet  not  I,  but  Christ  is  living  in 
me."  We  cannot  invite  Him  as  a  visible  presence 
into  our  homes,  we  cannot  take  Him  as  a  compan- 
ion with  us  on  our  journeys,  but  we  may  make  a 
home  for  Him  in  our  hearts,  so  that  wherever  we 
may  be.  He  shall  truly  and  always  be  with  us. 

No  one  can  read,  I  think,  this  story,  without 
understanding  what  He  meant  when  He  said  to 
His  disciples,  ''It  is  expedient  for  you  that  I  should 


192  Life  Indeed 

go  away;  " — without  realizing  the  gain  to  them,  and 
to  us  also,  which  comes  from  the  fact  that  He  is 
with  His  people  now  as  a  spiritual  presence  in  their 
thoughts  and  hearts  and  lives.  Such  a  dreadful 
possibility  as  that  which  then  presented  itself  to 
their  minds — that  they  and  He  might  perish  to- 
gether— is  no  longer  even  conceivable.  Our  com- 
panionship with  Him  is  not  affected  by  the  acci- 
dents of  life.  It  is  no  more  a  question,  whether 
or  not  He  will  go  before  us  or  with  us,  or  whether 
we  shall  go  with  Him  or  without  Him,  along  our 
earthly  journey.  He  has  come  to  be,  if  I  may  so 
express  it,  a  part  of  us,  and  we  can  no  more  be 
separated  from  Him  than  we  can  be  separated  from 
ourselves.  He  it  is  whose  thought  is  moulding 
and  inspiring  ours,  whose  spirit  is  animating  and 
governing  ours,  who,  as  a  divine  energy  within  us, 
is  directing  our  conduct,  and  forming  our  charac- 
ters, and  controlling  our  lives.  And  out  of  the 
great  and  blessed  fact  that  because  we  have  given 
ourselves  to  Him  He  has  taken  such  possession  of 
us,  comes  our  assurance  of  safety  amidst  all  the 
emergencies  and  perils  of  life.  No  real  evil  can 
befall  us  if  we  abide  in  this  relation  to  Him.  For 
He  has  the  power,  as  He  has  certainly  the  will,  to 
turn  all  apparent  evil  into  good.  We  may  have  to 
toil  and  suffer,  we  may  be  almost  overwhelmed  by 
disappointment,  our  plans  may  be  shattered,  our 
hopes  may  be  quenched,  we  may  feel  that  we  are 
accomplishing  nothing,  it  may  seem  as  if  the  battle 


Jesus  Asleep  193 

of  life  were  going  against  us,  and  as  if  neither  our 
own  best  aspirations  nor  the  promises  of  God  were 
to  be  fulfilled.  But  it  is  not  so.  If  Christ  is  in 
our  hearts  and  in  our  lives,  ruling  them,  moulding 
them,  and  working  in  and  through  them  His  own 
will,  then  we  are  perfectly  safe.  Let  the  storm  rage, 
let  the  sea  toss  us  in  its  mighty  arms,  let  the  cloud- 
wrack  blot  the  sun  and  stars  out  of  the  sky,  we 
will  not  complain,  Ave  will  not  fear !  We  are 
Christ's  and  He  is  ours.  He  is  with  us,  and  noth- 
ing can  harm  us.  What  are  winds  and  waves  to 
Him  who  made  them,  who  holds  them  as  in  the 
hollow  of  His  hand,  who  rouses  them  as  He  listeth, 
and  who  says  to  them,  "  Peace,  be  still !  " 

Here  too  is  the  safety  of  the  Church.  Not  in  its 
numbers  or  its  wealth  or  its  social  prestige ;  not  in 
the  antiquity  or  the  accuracy  of  its  symbols ;  not  in 
the  friendship  or  the  honor  of  the  world ;  it  is  in 
the  fact  that  the  Spirit  of  Jesus  Christ  is  in  it.  It 
is  bearing  Him,  so  to  speak,  across  the  floods  of 
time.  Not  as  a  lovely  memory,  not  as  a  rare  ideal, 
not  as  a  form  once  living  but  now  dead,  embalmed 
in  the  fragrance  of  a  loving  but  vain  devotion  ;  not 
thus,  but  as  a  vital,  vivifying,  energizing  power,  is 
Christ  present  in  His  Church.  He  has  been  in  it 
from  the  beginning.  He  is  in  it  still.  And  that 
is  what  has  saved  it  in  all  the  stormy  scenes  through 
which  it  has  passed.  That  is  what  will  save  it  in 
all  the  time  to  come.  Where  is  your  faith,  O  you 
who  think  that  the  Church  is  decaying,  that  the 


194  Life  Indeed 

gospel  is  losing  its  power,  that  the  time  is  coming 
when  Christianity  will  be  thrown  up  with  other 
wrecked  religions  on  the  shore,  while  men  go  sail- 
ing proudly  forth  into  new  and  vaster  seas  of 
thought?  Where  is  your  faith  in  Him  who  said, 
"Lo!  I  am  with  you  always,  therefore  go  and 
teach  the  nations  "  ?  Not  until  that  promise  fails, 
not  until  the  power  which  subdued  the  angry  sea  is 
itself  conquered  by  some  greater  power,  can  the 
gospel  lose  its  vitality,  or  the  Church  be  arrested  in 
its  mighty  career. 

And  Jesus  is  not  now  asleep.  It  sometimes 
seems  as  if  He  were.  No  doubt  it  has  often  seemed 
so  to  us,  when  the  waves  and  billows  of  some  ter- 
rible experience  were  rolling  over  us,  when  our 
prayers  seemed  to  be  unheard,  when  the  help  we 
needed  did  not  come,  when  all  was  dark  within  as 
well  as  round  about  us,  and  our  faith  in  God  and 
man  was  on  the  point  of  giving  way.  It  has 
seemed  to  us,  possibly,  as  if  Jesus  must  be  asleep, 
when  His  Church  has  been  rent  by  warring  fac- 
tions, or  dishonored  by  the  scandalous  conduct  of 
its  members,  or  transformed  into  a  haughty  and 
ambitious  hierarchy,  or  invaded  and  benumbed  by 
the  spirit  of  the  world.  We  have  remembered  the 
bitter  taunt  flung  by  Elijah  at  the  priests  of  Baal, 
and  have  felt  as  if  the  enemies  of  our  divine  Lord 
might  almost  address  it  to  us  :  "  Cry  aloud  !  for 
he  is  a  god.  Either  he  is  talking,  or  he  is  pur- 
suing, or  he  is  in  a  journey,  or  perad venture  he 


Jesus  Asleep  195 

sleepeth  and  must  be  awakened  ! "  It  is  hard  to 
believe  that  He  is  calmly  looking  on  while  some 
things  that  we  observe  from  day  to  day  are  taking 
place  on  earth;  that  He  knows  what  His  people 
are  suffering ;  that  He  knows  to  what  His  Church 
is  exposed.  And  there  are  those  who  honestly 
think  that  He  is  asleep.  There  are  those  who  do 
not  hesitate  to  say  that  He  has  never  wakened  out 
of  that  deep  slumber  into  which  He  fell,  when  the 
noonday  darkness  gathered  over  Him  and  He 
ceased  to  speak  and  move.  In  musical  but  mourn- 
ful verse  they  sing : 

Now  He  is  dead !     Far  hence  He  lies 

In  the  lorn  Syrian  town ; 
And  on  His  grave,  with  shining  eyes, 

The  Syrian  stars  look  down. 

No,  He  is  neither  dead  nor  sleeping !  In  spite 
of  everything  which  may  cast  a  momentary  doubt 
upon  His  power  to  do  anything  now  for  the  Church 
or  for  the  world,  Christendom  still  bears  witness  to 
the  fact  that  He  is  living ;  the  Church  itself  bears 
witness  to  the  fact  of  His  continuing  union  with  it. 
The  inmost  consciousness  of  millions  of  believing 
and  adoring  hearts  bears  witness  to  His  indwelling 
presence.  He  is  living,  not  in  heaven  only,  but 
here  in  the  midst  of  us  on  earth.  And  He  is  ever 
ready  to  work.  He  is  ever  actually  working,  for  the 
defence,  the  deliverance,  and  the  consolation  of 
those  who  trust  and  serve  Him,  and  for  the  ad- 


196  Life  Indeed 

vancement  of  His  kingdom  toward  its  final  tri- 
umph. 

It  is  never  possible,  in  any  given  emergency, 
either  in  our  personal  experience  or  in  the  life  of 
the  Church,  to  know  when  or  how  He  will  manifest 
His  power.  But  we  may  always  be  sure  of  this, 
that  the  more  critical  the  emergency,  the  more  im- 
minent the  peril,  so  much  the  more  certain  is  He 
to  make  it  an  occasion  for  some  signal  revelation 
of  His  glory.  So  it  has  been  a  thousand  times 
since  He  rose  from  His  sleep  at  the  cry  of  His  dis- 
ciples and  hushed  the  tempest  with  a  word.  What 
they  expected  Him  to  do  when  they  awoke  Him, 
we  cannot  imagine.  They  could  not  probably 
themselves  have  said.  Doubtless  the  very  last 
thing  which  they  looked  for,  was  the  thing  that 
happened.  Never  since  the  world  began  had  the 
waters  and  the  winds  listened  to  a  human  voice 
and  ceased  their  raging  because  it  commanded 
them  to  be  still.  But  so  it  was  that .  He  who 
showed  His  need  of  sleep  after  a  day  of  toil, 
showed  also  His  possession  of  a  power  to  which 
nothing,  absolutely,  was  impossible.  And  we  have 
a  perfect  right  to  believe  that  when  we  are  in  the 
very  direst  straits  and  the  very  deadliest  peril,  we 
have  then  most  reason  to  expect  the  pity  and  the 
help  of  Christ.  We  ought  long  ago  to  have  learned 
that  what  is  not  only  improbable  but  impossible  for 
us,  is  perfectly  easy  for  Him.  There  is  no  danger 
from  which  He  cannot  rescue  us,  there  is  no  sor- 


Jesus  Asleep  197 

row  in  which  He  cannot  comfort  us,  there  is  no 
burden  which  He  cannot  enable  us  to  bear,  there 
is  no  duty  which  we  cannot  do  with  His  aid.  It 
does  not  make  the  shghtest  difference  how  great 
our  need  is,  He  can  supply  it ;  it  does  not  make 
the  slightest  difference  how  great  our  prayer  is,  He 
can  answer  it.  ''All  power,"  He  said,  ''in  heaven 
and  on  earth,  is  given  unto  Me,"  and  therefore  we 
may  trust  Him  absolutely  and  always. 

And  so  it  follows  that  no  Christian  should  ever 
be  afraid  of  anything.  I  do  not  mean,  of  course, 
that  there  are  any  of  us  to  whom  trial  and  suffering 
will  not  come.  I  do  not  mean  that  we  shall  not 
meet  with  many  a  loss,  with  many  a  disaster,  or 
that  we  shall  not  by  and  by  be  called  to  part  with 
life  itself.  Christ  does  not  always  rebuke  the 
storm.  He  sometimes  lets  it  rage  in  all  its  fury. 
But  He  enables  us  to  ride  it  out  in  safety.  Or  if, 
as  sometimes  happens,  He  lets  us  go  down  under 
it,  He  transforms  even  that  mysterious  experience 
into  a  blessing.  He  leads  us,  not  merely  under  the 
cloud,  but  through  it,  not  merely  over  the  sea,  but 
through  it,  very  often ;  but  He  brings  us,  or  will 
bring  us  by  and  by,  in  safety  to  the  heavenly  land. 
Dropping  all  figures  of  speech  :  nothing  can  harm 
any  one  who  is  a  true  follower  of  Christ.  No  evil, 
however  great,  however  real,  can  befall  him,  which 
will  not  prove  a  source  of  good.  That  is  His 
promise,  and  those  who  have  believed  it,  have  al- 
ways found  it  fulfilled.     Not  here  on  earth,  neces- 


198  Life   Indeed 

sarily,  but  somewhere  in  the  vast  realms  of  life  ap- 
pointed for  us,  His  discipline  of  our  characters  will 
bear  its  golden  fruit.  Defeat  will  be  turned  into 
triumph,  sorrow  into  joy,  disappointment  and  dis- 
aster into  an  eternal  weight  of  glory. 

So,  then,  if  any  of  us  are  in  trouble,  we  may 
well  do  as  the  disciples  did — go  to  Jesus  for  help. 
Stand  up  bravely  to  your  work,  as  they  did,  how- 
ever laborious  and  perilous  it  may  be,  as  long  as 
you  can.  Do  not  give  up  the  ship,  though  it  may 
seem  as  if  you  must  soon  be  washed  out  of  it,  or 
as  if  you  and  it  must  ere  long  go  down  together. 
Work  and  pray  at  the  same  time,  but  never  give 
up  your  faith  in  God,  in  Christ,  in  the  divine  wis- 
dom, power,  and  love.  It  is  not  very  much  to  be 
wondered  at  that  our  faith  sometimes  fails  us  in 
the  crises  of  life,  yet  these  are  the  times  when  we 
need  it  most,  and  these  are  the  times  that  it  is 
meant  for.  I  am  almost  tempted  to  say  that  we  can 
get  along  without  it  when  everything  goes  well  with 
us ;  but  when  everything  is  going  against  us,  and 
when  nothing  else  is  left  to  us,  then  it  is  that  faith, 
blind,  unreasoning,  if  you  will  have  it  so,  but  un- 
wavering and  unconquerable,  is  an  unspeakable 
solace  and  support. 

And  lastly,  if  you  have  faith  enough  at  such  a 
time  to  lead  you  to  go  to  Christ,  you  have  faith 
enough ;  not  all  that  you  desire,  perhaps,  nor  all 
that  you  have  prayed  for,  nor  all  that  you  have  ex- 
pected God  to  give  you.     But  you  have  enough  to 


Jesus  Asleep  199 

save  you  from  your  troubles,  from  your  fears,  from 
your  perils,  from  your  sins  even,  because  it  is  not 
your  faith,  it  is  always  Christ  that  saves ;  and  if 
you  will  only  go  to  Him  and  ask  His  pity,  pardon, 
and  help,  you  will  have  a  clearer,  stronger  and 
more  jubilant  faith  in  Him  as  time  goes  on.  For 
He  will  surely  strengthen  as  well  as  reward  it.  All 
that  we  need  is  simply  to  trust  Him,  and  then  to 
let  Him  do  with  us  and  for  us  what  He  will. 
*' Carest  Thou  not  that  we  perish?"  cried  the 
alarmed  disciples.  O  who  in  all  the  universe  cares 
so  much  that  we  should  not  perish,  as  He  who  so 
loved  us  that  He  died  for  us,  who  watches  over  us 
unceasingly,  who  is  always  seeking  to  bind  us  more 
closely  to  Himself,  and  who,  when  the  voyage  of 
this  life  is  over,  will  surely  land  us  on  the  celestial 
shore  ? 


THE  LEADERSHIP  OF  LITTLE  CHILDREN 


And  a  little  child  shall  lead  them. — Isa.  xi.  6. 


XI 

THE  LEADERSHIP  OF  LITTLE  CHILDREN 

Almost  every  people  has  had  its  dream  of  a 
golden  age.  In  most  of  the  ancient  mythologies 
there  is  found  a  tradition  of  a  better  time,  when  the 
earth  was  the  common  property  of  man,  and  pro- 
duced of  itself  whatever  he  needed.  The  land 
then  flowed  with  milk  and  honey.  Beasts  of  prey 
lived  peaceably  with  other  animals,  and  men  were 
free  from  selfishness  and  pride  and  the  other  pas- 
sions and  vices  which  now  mar  their  happiness. 
The  Greeks  and  Romans  placed  this  golden  age 
under  the  rule  of  Saturn,  and  cherished  the  hope 
that  it  would  some  day  return.  There  is  a  famous 
passage  in  one  of  the  eclogues  of  Virgil,  which  may 
possibly  have  been  suggested  by  that  prophecy  of 
Isaiah  from  which  the  text  is  taken,  ''Now,"  he 
says,  ''the  reign  of  Saturn  begins  again.  Every- 
where the  earth  pours  forth  her  fruits  without  cul- 
ture. The  fields  grow  yellow  with  soft  ears  of  corn. 
Blushing  grapes  hang  on  rude  brambles,  and  hard 
oaks  distill  honey.  The  ground  shall  not  endure 
the  harrow,  nor  the  vineyard  the  pruning-hook. 
The  serpent  also  shall  die,  poisonous  plants  disap- 
pear, and  the  Assyrian  spikenard  shall  grow  in 
every  soil." 

203 


204  Life  Indeed 

A  similar  picture  of  the  golden  age  that  is  to 
come  is  given  in  Pope's  stately  ode  on  the  Messiah : 

On  rifted  rocks,  the  dragon's  late  abode, 

The  green  reed  trembles  and  the  bulrush  nods ; 

Waste  sandy  valleys,  once  perplexed  with  thorn, 

The  spiry  fir  and  shapely  box  adorn ; 

To  leafless  shrubs  the  flowery  palms  succeed, 

And  odorous  myrtle  to  the  noisome  weed ; 

The  lambs  with  wolves  shall  graze  the  verdant  mead, 

And  boys  in  flowery  bands  the  tiger  lead ; 

The  steer  and  lion  at  one  crib  shall  meet, 

And  harmless  serpents  lick  the  pilgrim's  feet ; 

The  smiling  infant  in  his  hand  shall  take 

The  crested  basilisk  and  speckled  snake, — 

Pleased  the  green  lustre  of  the  scales  survey, 

And  with  their  forked  tongues  shall  innocently  play. 

But  neither  the  Latin  nor  the  English  poet  has 
equaled  the  simplicity  and  beauty  of  the  ancient 
Hebrew  prophecy  by  which  the  latter  at  least  was 
certainly  inspired:  "The  wolf  also  shall  dwell 
with  the  lamb,  and  the  leopard  shall  lie  down  with 
the  kid ;  and  the  calf  and  the  young  lion  and  the 
fatling  together ;  and  a  little  child  shall  lead  them. 
And  the  cow  and  the  bear  shall  feed,  their  young 
ones  shall  lie  down  together ;  and  the  lion  shall  eat 
straw  like  the  ox.  And  the  sucking  child  shall  play 
on  the  hole  of  the  asp,  and  the  weaned  child  shall 
put  his  hand  on  the  basilisk's  den.  They  shall  not 
hurt  nor  destroy  in  all  my  holy  mountain  ;  for  the 
earth  shall  be  full  of  the  knowledge  of  the  Lord,  as 
the  waters  cover  the  sea." 


Leadership  of  Little  Children     205 

In  this  splendid  language  the  blessedness  of  the 
reign  of  Messiah  is  foretold.  It  is  to  be  an  age  of 
universal  peace,  when  even  wild  beasts  will  lose 
their  ferocity,  and  men  hardly  less  savage  will  dwell 
together  in  harmony  and  love.  The  vision  has  not 
yet  been  fulfilled.  But  the  forces  which  tend  to 
accomplish  it  entered  into  human  life  with  the  com- 
ing of  the  Lord  Jesus  to  the  earth,  and  day  by  day 
and  year  by  year  the  world  is  steadily  moving  to- 
ward it.  The  whole  creation,  according  to  the 
great  thought  of  the  apostle  Paul,  shares  in  the  re- 
demption which  He  came  to  work  out,  and  the  time 
is  certainly  approaching  when  the  prophecy  of  the 
angels'  song  will  be  fulfilled,  and  there  shall  be 
peace  on  earth  as  there  is  glory  and  praise  in 
heaven. 

One  part  of  the  prophet's  glowing  picture  is 
worthy  to  be  separated  from  the  rest  and  considered 
by  itself.  ^'A  little  child  shall  lead  them."  It 
suggests  as  a  topic  which  is  peculiarly  appropriate 
to  the  Christmas  season,  the  Leadership  of  Little 
Children. 

We  do  not  commonly  associate  the  idea  of  lead- 
ership with  childhood.  It  seems  rather  to  require 
mental  and  moral  as  well  as  physical  qualities  which 
belong  only  to  maturer  years.  To  be  a  leader  of 
men  one  must  have  what  a  child  does  not  possess, 
a  clear  and  trained  intelligence,  a  strong  and  well 
regulated  will,  a  firm  but  gentle  hand.  Leadership 
implies  a  certain  large  experience  of  life,  or  at  all 


206  Life   Indeed 

events  a  natural  energy  and  a  power  of  self-control, 
which  are  rare  even  in  men,  and  are  not  to  be 
looked  for  in  children.  And  yet  there  are  many 
senses  in  which  children  are  really  the  leaders  of 
those  who  far  smrpass  them  in  knowledge  and  in 
power.  The  fact  is  a  sign  that  the  kingdom  of 
heaven  has  already  come  in  some  measure ;  it  is  a 
prophecy  that  it  is  yet  to  come  completely  and 
everj'^-here. 

A  little  child  is  not  a  safe  leader  in  matters 
which  require  wise  judgment  and  a  varied  ex- 
perience. Ob\-ious  however  as  this  is,  it  is  very 
often  lost  sight  of,  in  this  country  especially,  and  at 
the  present  day.  It  is  sometimes  said  with  some 
truth  that  we  are  reversing  the  ancient  command, 
and  are  reading  it  thus :  Parents,  obey  your  chil- 
dren. Some  of  us  at  least  imagine  that  we  discern 
both  in  our  own  children  and  in  those  of  other  people 
a  spirit  of  self-confidence,  self-will  and  independence 
of  authority,  which  is  not  altogether  prophetic  of 
good.  It  may  be,  perhaps,  in  the  eager  American 
blood .  It  may  be  strengthened  and  stimulated  by  the 
keen  American  air.  It  is,  at  all  events,  fostered  by 
certain  usages  and  influences  that  are  prominent  in 
American  life.  Not  a  few  parents  in  our  day  are 
not  merely  led  but  ruled  by  their  children.  And 
children  sometimes  have  a  way  of  putting  fonvard 
their  opinions,  of  delivering  their  judgments,  of 
insisting  that  their  tastes  shall  be  gratified  and  their 
will  be  obeyed,  which  is,  to  say  the  least,  a  wide 


Leadership  of  Little  Children     207 

departure  from  the  practice  of  former  times.  There 
is  no  doubt  a  tendency  in  elderly  people  to  resent 
and  resist  what  appears  to  them  to  be  the  intrusion 
of  the  younger  generation  upon  the  stage  of  life, 
where  they  themselves  have  hitherto  played  the 
leading  parts.  But  not  old  people  alone,  all 
thoughtful  observers  remark  in  our  American  life  a 
certain  uppishness  and  forwardness,  a  rude  self- 
assertion,  on  the  part  of  the  young,  which  is  hardly 
in  keeping  with  the  fitness  of  things,  and  which 
does  not  tend  to  elevate  the  tone  of  society.  The 
ancient  form  of  the  command  was  much  better.  It 
is  more  in  accord  with  the  constitution  of  society, 
as  that  was  ordained  by  its  divine  Author,  and 
both  parents  and  children  are  likely  to  be  happier 
if  it  is  left  as  it  was  written  by  the  finger  of  God  on 
the  tables  of  stone  and  on  human  nature  as  well. 
There  is  great  beauty,  certainly,  in  the  eager 
enthusiasm  of  childhood  and  youth,  in  its  dash  and 
its  fire,  its  self-confidence  and  its  energy.  And 
yet,  after  all,  experience  too  is  worth  something  in 
the  practical  conduct  of  life.  There  are  certain 
lessons  to  be  learned  from  the  past  which  childhood 
has  not  yet  had  time  to  gather  up,  and  the  mature 
and  practiced  judgment  is  a  safer  guide  than  an 
active  but  undisciplined  brain  and  a  fervid  but 
ungovemed  temper.  It  is  better  to  place  a  pyramid 
on  its  base  than  on  its  apex.  A  ship  is  more 
likely  to  come  safely  into  port  if  it  is  under  the  con- 
trol of  experienced  sailors  than  of  novices  who  are 


208  Life  Indeed 

going  to  sea  for  the  first  time.  Raw  recruits  have 
their  place  and  their  value  in  an  army,  but  the 
battle  is  more  likely  to  be  won  if  they  have  trained 
and  tried  officers  over  them.  Life  is  not  altogether 
an  experiment.  Men  have  been  living  a  long  time. 
Some  things  have  been  found  out.  Some  principles 
are  settled.  And  life  is  most  likely  to  be  successful 
when  these  principles  govern  it,  and  when  it  is 
shaped  in  accordance  with  the  wisdom  of  the  past. 
If  there  is  to  be  law,  authority,  obedience,  it  seems 
natural  that  the  sources  of  it  should  be  at  the  top 
and  not  at  the  bottom.  If  the  judgment  of  the 
aged  comes  into  collision  with  that  of  the  young,  it 
would  seem  to  be  proper  that  the  young  should  give 
way.  The  simple  fact  is  that  children  need  guid- 
ance, and  are  not  competent  to  be  the  guides  of 
those  who  are  older  and  wiser  than  they.  It  is  no 
infringement  of  their  rights,  no  restriction  of  their 
independence,  that  they  should  follow  while  others 
lead.  The  duty  of  patient  forbearance  on  the  part 
of  the  parent  ought  not  to  need  insisting  upon. 
Not  only  the  rights  but  the  weaknesses  of  childhood 
are  to  be  taken  into  account.  ''  I  do  not  beat  my 
child,"  said  a  wise  man  once,  "the  world  will  beat 
him  fast  enough."  Children  are  more  easily  led 
than  driven.  And  yet  the  child  that  has  never 
learned  to  submit  to  authority  and  yield  to  control, 
is  likely  never  to  learn  to  govern  and  control  him- 
self. The  world  will  not  be  better  managed  than 
jt  is  at  present,  if  the  authority  which  hitherto  has 


Leadership  of  Little  Children     209 

belonged  to  the  parent  is  usurped  by  the  child. 
The  precept  of  the  apostle  Paul,  "  Children,  obey 
your  parents,"  is  still  sound,  though  somewhat  old- 
fashioned. 

But  that  leadership  of  children  of  which  I  would 
especially  speak  is  not  a  deliberate  but  an  uncon- 
scious leadership.  They  lead  us,  for  one  thing, 
into  a  deeper  knowledge  of  love.  We  do  not, 
indeed,  get  from  them  our  first  lessons  in  love,  for 
we  bring  great  capacities  of  loving  with  us  into  the 
world,  and  these  find  their  objects  very  early  in  life. 
The  first  thing  almost  which  we  learn  is  to  love. 
Our  power  to  love  grows  stronger  as  the  years 
advance.  We  love  our  friends,  we  love  our  homes, 
we  love  our  country,  we  love  the  natural  world 
around  us,  we  love  God  and  truth  and  virtue, 
without  perhaps  any  distinct  help  from  our  children. 
And  there  is  a  love  which  binds  human  hearts 
together,  though  they  may  have  long  lived  as 
strangers  to  each  other,  in  a  relation  which  is  the 
most  intimate  and  sacred  in  life.  And  yet  every 
little  child  brings  to  its  parents  a  new  revelation  of 
the  nature  and  depth  and  power  of  love.  There  is 
certainly  a  difference  between  parental  love  and 
any  other.  There  are  in  it  elements  of  unselfish- 
ness, of  patience,  of  watchful  care,  of  hope  and 
fear,  of  pride  and  grief,  for  which  we  look  else- 
where in  vain.  No  other  form  of  human  affection 
is  so  pure.  No  other  is  so  utterly  incomprehensible 
to  one  who  has  not  felt  it.     The  little  child,  whose 


210  Life  Indeed 

presence  awakens  it,  is  utterly  ignorant  of  its  in- 
tensity, and  often  holds  it  in  slight  esteem.  It  is  a 
love  which  asks  for  very  little,  but  which  cannot 
possibly  give  too  much;  a  love  which  seeks  the 
highest  welfare  of  its  object,  and  is  as  free  from 
jealousy  as  it  is  from  self-seeking.  It  is  of  all 
sentiments  the  most  generous  and  elastic,  giving 
itself  forth  to  each  one  of  many  children  as  if  that 
were  the  only  child.  And  so  it  is  the  best  earthly 
type  of  the  unmeasured  love  of  God.  The  Saviour 
Himself  could  find  no  better  image  than  that  of  a 
father  under  which  to  reveal  to  us  the  great  Being 
who  had  sent  Him,  and  He  even  appealed,  in  His 
instruction,  to  our  love  for  our  children  as  a  proof 
of  God's  love  for  us.  <<If  ye  then,"  He  said, 
*' being  evil  know  how  to  give  good  gifts  to  your 
children,  how  much  more  shall  your  Father  in 
heaven  give  you  everything  you  need."  It  is 
certainly  a  most  striking  thought  which  the  late 
Professor  Drummond  has  so  brilliantly  urged,  that 
the  whole  progress  of  the  creation,  from  the  first 
appearance  of  life  on  earth,  has  tended  toward  the 
development  of  love.  He  has  pointed  out  to  us  in 
the  slow  evolutions  of  the  past  not  merely  a  struggle 
for  life,  but  a  struggle  for  the  life  of  others,  which 
culminates  at  last  in  the  affection  of  a  mother  for 
her  child.  ''  The  idea  of  mothers,"  he  says,  **  has 
from  the  beginning  been  in  Nature's  mind,  and  she 
has  always  been  trying  to  draw  closer  and  closer 
the  bonds  which  unite  the  children  of  men."     If  it 


Leadership  of  Little  Children     211 

is  love  which  gives  to  the  world  the  little  child,  the 
child  amply  repays  the  debt  by  the  love  which  it 
awakens  in  the  heart  of  the  parent ;  and  as  there  is 
nothing  in  us  which  is  nobler  than  this  parental 
affection,  our  highest  development  is,  in  a  sense,  in 
the  hands  of  our  children.  It  is  theirs  to  lead  us 
to  heights  of  experience  from  which  we  obtain  the 
clearest  visions,  and  on  which  we  breathe  the 
purest  airs. 

Unconsciously  also  do  little  children  lead  us  to 
realize  the  charm  and  beauty  of  certain  traits  of 
personal  character.  We  do  not,  of  course,  look 
to  them  as  examples  of  qualities  which  are  the 
product  of  training  and  experience,  which,  if  not 
originated,  are  developed  and  made  prominent  by 
collision  with  the  world,  and  by  the  responsibility 
and  suffering  of  which  this  is  the  cause.  We  fre- 
quently speak  of  the  character  of  a  child  as  un- 
formed, and  so  in  one  sense  it  is.  It  is  not  ham- 
mered into  shape  by  the  influences  of  society,  nor 
hardened  by  habit  into  unalterable  forms.  It  is 
still  docile  and  pliant,  waiting  to  be  moulded,  as  it 
may  be,  by  wise  training  on  the  one  hand,  or  by 
the  accidental  influence  of  circumstances  on  the 
other.  But  just  for  this  reason  it  shows  us  what 
human  nature  is  in  its  essence  and  at  its  best.  It 
has  a  freshness,  a  purity,  which  may  afterward  be 
lost,  like  that  of  the  early  morning  air  before  it  is 
clouded  and  stained  by  volumes  of  smoke  from 
factory  chimneys.     As    Dr.    Guthrie   says,   "The 


212  Life  Indeed 

morning,  with  every  flower  glistening  in  dews,  the 
fresh  air  loaded  with  perfumes,  the  hills  bathed  in 
golden  light,  the  skies  ringing  with  the  song  of 
larks,  is  beautiful ;  and  beautiful  as  the  morning  of 
day  is  that  of  life." 

There  is  in  childhood  a  sweet  simplicity,  for  ex- 
ample, which  has  an  infinite  charm  for  one  who 
turns  to  it  from  the  artificiality  and  deceitfulness  of 
later  life.  Concealment  and  cunning  are  the  vices 
at  once  of  the  lowest  and  of  the  highest  civiliza- 
tion. The  savage  exhibits  them  at  one  extreme, 
the  highly  trained  man  of  affairs  at  the  other.  To 
hide  what  we  do  not  want  to  have  known,  to  put 
the  best  possible  appearance  upon  what  we  do,  to 
try  to  make  other  people  think  that  we  are  a  little 
richer,  wiser  or  better  than  we  are,  how  common 
all  this  is  among  us  !  How  rare  is  absolute  hon- 
esty, truthfulness,  sincerity,  in  word  and  deed  ! 
But  this,  in  its  absolute  perfection,  is  shown  by  the 
little  child,  whose  nature  is  as  transparent  as  the 
waters  of  a  mountain  lake,  or  as  the  cloudless  sum- 
mer sky.  Every  thought  and  feeling  is  instantly 
expressed  in  word  and  look,  with  a  frankness  that 
is  as  free  from  suspicion  as  from  fear.  The  child 
does  not  feel  the  need  of  concealment,  until  driven 
to  it,  perhaps,  by  unkindness  or  injustice,  and  all 
pretence  is  foreign  to  its  nature.  Herein  is  the 
secret  of  its  singular  power  even  over  coarse  and 
hardened  minds ;  and  few  things  are  sadder  than 
to  see   the   frank   simplicity  of  childhood   giving 


Leadership  of  Little  Children     213 

place  to  the  reserve  and  caution,  perhaps  the  cun- 
ning and  hypocrisy,  which  are  so  early  learned 
from  contact  with  the  world.  As  long  as  it  lasts, 
it  not  only  attracts  and  fascinates  others,  but  it 
tends  to  make  them  also  genuine  and  true.  But 
once  lost,  it  can  seldom  be  recovered,  except  as 
sometimes,  at  the  other  extreme  of  life,  the  truth 
and  the  Spirit  of  God  may  develop  in  old  age  a 
simplicity  of  character  which  is  like  that  of  child- 
hood. 

Then,  for  another  thing,  little  children  are  the 
world's  best  teachers  of  faith.  It  is  perfectly  nat- 
ural to  a  child  to  believe.  It  undoubtingly  accepts 
what  is  told  it  as  the  truth,  and  it  relies  with  a  con- 
fidence which  sometimes  makes  one  tremble,  on 
the  power,  wisdom  and  love  of  older  people. 
Doubt  and  distrust  come  later,  casting  their  icy 
chill  upon  the  heart.  The  child  believes  not  only 
everything  but  everybody.  It  has,  of  course,  to 
learn  that  not  every  statement  is  true,  not  every 
man  or  woman  worthy  of  confidence,  but  the 
sweet  and  simple  trustfulness  of  little  children  not 
only  touches  the  heart  of  every  one  who  observes 
it,  but  tends  to  make  those  toward  whom  it  is  shown 
worthy  of  the  confidence  which  is  thus  reposed  in 
them.  Few  things  reveal  a  brutal  and  vicious  na- 
ture more  clearly  than  willingness  to  deceive  a  little 
child.  No  one  in  this  world  is  wise  or  strong  or 
good  enough  to  be  worthy  of  such  implicit  trust, 
but  there  is  One  above  us  on  whom  we  can  thus 


214  Life  Indeed 

rely  with  an  absolute  faith.  And  this  surely  must 
have  been  one  of  the  things  which  the  Lord  had  in 
mind,  when  He  said  that  except  we  become  as 
little  children  we  cannot  enter  the  kingdom  of 
heaven. 

Another  element  in  the  beauty  of  childhood  is 
its  still  unsullied  purity.  It  is  hard  to  look  into 
the  face  of  a  child  and  retain  one's  faith  in  original 
sin.  Of  course,  there  are  in  all  children  capaci- 
ties of  evil  and  tendencies  toward  it,  which  will 
not  be  slow  in  revealing  themselves,  as  there  are 
forces  of  destruction  slumbering  in  the  softest  sum- 
mer air.  But,  as  a  lover  of  little  children  has  said, 
"Fallen  though  we  are,  there  remains  a  purity, 
modesty,  ingenuousness,  and  tenderness  of  con- 
science about  childhood,  that  looks  as  if  the  glory 
of  Eden  yet  lingered  over  it,  like  the  light  of  even 
on  the  hilltops  when  the  sun  is  down."  Innocent, 
at  all  events,  a  little  child  still  is,  of  the  evil  which 
is  around  it  in  the  world.  Alas,  that  it  must  ever 
come  to  know  how  great  and  how  dark  it  is  ! 
What  a  responsibility  rests  upon  a  parent  for  keep- 
ing, so  far  as  human  power  can,  the  mind  and  soul 
of  a  child  from  contact  with  what  is  base  and  vile  ! 
What  a  responsibility  rests  upon  society  at  large, 
for  the  preservation,  not  merely  of  the  physical, 
but  of  the  moral  health  of  children  !  It  is  not 
only  one  of  the  most  sacred  things  on  earth,  it  is 
also  a  purifying  influence  in  the  sphere  of  life  in 
which  it  is  observed.     It  tends  to  keep  those  around 


Leadership  of  Little  Children     215 

it  pure.  How  many  a  man  has  been  restrained  by 
it  from  evil  deeds  that  he  was  tempted  to  commit ! 
There  is  a  sentence  in  Juvenal  which  expresses  a 
thought  which  was  rare  in  antiquity,  but  is  com- 
mon enough  now.  "The  greatest  reverence,"  he 
says,  ''is  due  to  a  boy.  If  you  are  making  ready 
for  anything  base,  do  not  despise  the  years  of  the 
child,  but  let  your  infant  son  stand  in  the  way  of 
the  sin  about  to  be  committed."  The  purity  of 
children  not  only  hinders  the  commission  of  sin,  it 
has  a  thousand  times  led  to  the  reformation  of 
those  already  hardened  by  it.  Thankful  indeed 
ought  we  to  be  for  the  moral  influence  which  they 
unconsciously  exert.  '*God  sends  them  to  us," 
says  Mary  Howitt,  ''for  another  purpose  than 
merely  to  keep  up  the  race.  He  sends  them  to  en- 
large our  hearts,  to  make  us  unselfish  and  full  of 
kindly  affections  and  sympathies,  to  give  our  souls 
higher  aims,  to  call  out  all  our  faculties,  to  extend 
enterprise  and  exertion,  to  bring  around  our  fire- 
sides bright  faces  and  happy  smiles  and  loving, 
tender  hearts.  My  soul  praises  the  great  Father 
every  day  that  He  has  gladdened  the  earth  with 
little  children." 

These  last  words  remind  us,  for  another  thing, 
that  it  is  the  little  child  who  leads  the  household 
and  who  makes  the  home.  There  are,  indeed, 
beautiful  homes  which  are  not  brightened  by  the 
presence  of  children.  Yet  there  is  truth  in  the 
quaint   sentence   of  Southey,  who   says   that    "a 


216  Life  Indeed 

house  is  never  perfectly  furnished  for  enjoyment 
unless  there  is  a  child  in  it  rising  three  years  old, 
and  a  kitten  rising  three  weeks."  ''Tell  me  not," 
says  another  writer,  *'of  the  trim,  precisely  ar- 
ranged homes,  where  there  are  no  children,  where, 
as  the  Germans  say,  'the  fly-traps  always  hang 
straight  on  the  wall.'  Tell  me  not  of  the  never- 
disturbed  nights  and  days,  of  the  tranquil,  un- 
anxious  hearts  where  children  are  not."  These 
are  not  the  homes  in  which  the  truest  happiness  is 
found.  It  is  a  simple  matter  of  history  that  houses 
were  first  built  for  the  shelter  of  children.  Men 
and  women  can  bear  exposure  and  hardship  which 
would  be  fatal  to  a  child.  But  the  tender  child-life 
makes  necessary  the  hut  in  which  the  savage  lives, 
and  out  of  which  has  grown,  by  natural  evolution, 
every  building  that  man  has  erected  on  the  earth. 
Palaces,  castles,  stately  and  splendid  cathedrals  are 
but  later  developments  of  the  thought  which  found 
its  first  expression  in  a  roof  of  boughs  and  a  wall 
of  mud.  The  necessities  of  childhood  have  thus 
led  to  all  the  various  architecture  of  the  world. 
But  it  is  true  also  that  morally  even  more  than 
physically,  it  is  the  little  child  who  makes  the 
home.  In  him  the  home-life  centres.  It  is  ad- 
justed to  his  physical  and  intellectual  wants,  to  his 
protection  and  care,  and  to  his  preparation  for  the 
activities  of  future  years.  The  little  life  which 
cannot  provide  for  itself,  which  cannot  prepare  it- 
self for  the   career  which   is  before  it,  not  merely 


Leadership  of  Little  Children     217 

awakens  love,  but  compels  and  directs  the  activity 
of  those  to  whose  loving  care  it  is  entrusted.  And 
all  this  directly  affects  and  even  determines  the 
character  of  the  parent  as  well  as  that  of  the 
child.  It  is  not  merely  true,  as  Lord  Bacon  says, 
that  ''he  that  hath  wife  and  children  hath  given 
hostages  to  fortune ' ' ;  but  the  various  needs  and 
claims  of  our  children  determine  in  great  measure 
what  we  shall  do,  and  so  decide  what  we  shall  be. 
It  is  the  little  child  that  leads  the  household. 

In  some  measure  also  it  leads  the  state.  We  all 
know  in  what  manner  the  ancient  state  regarded 
and  treated  the  child ;  how  it  placed  in  the  hands 
of  the  parent  absolute  power  of  life  and  death  ; 
how  it  ruthlessly  exposed  the  sickly  and  deformed ; 
how  it  left  the  others  to  be  educated  among  slaves, 
and  to  adopt  the  ideas  and  manners  and  vices  of 
slaves ;  how  it  regarded  even  their  death  as  a  mat- 
ter of  unconcern.  Contrast  with  all  this  the  pro- 
visions made  in  modern  communities  for  the  wel- 
fare of  the  little  child.  Think  of  the  care  which 
the  state  gives  to  its  mental  training  as  well  as  its 
physical  life;  how  it  protects  the  child  by  strin- 
gent laws  against  cruelty  and  neglect  on  the  part  of 
the  parent ;  how  it  provides  asylums  for  the  desti- 
tute and  the  orphan,  and  hospitals  for  the  care  of 
children  exclusively,  from  the  very  earliest  mo- 
ments of  life.  Of  course  the  power  which  has 
wrought  this  immense  change  in  the  temper  and 
attitude  of  the  state  toward  the  child  is  chiefly  the 


218  Life  Indeed 

Christian  religion;  and  if  that  religion  had  ac- 
complished nothing  else  in  the  world,  it  would  for 
this  alone  deserve  our  honor  and  gratitude.  "■  In- 
stitutions of  beneficence,"  as  Dr.  Storrs  has  said, 
"for  the  shelter  and  nurture  of  children,  such  as 
had  not  been  known  in  the  world  till  the  power  of 
Christianity  began  to  be  felt,  are  now  common  in 
the  countries  which  Christianity  has  blessed  ;  while 
the  Church,  inspired  by  the  words  and  the  action 
of  Him  whom  it  accepts  as  Master,  regulates  its 
worship,  constructs  its  buildings,  invents  or  ap- 
plies new  forms  of  art,  creates  a  new  literature,  to 
minister  to  children."  The  ancient  prophecy  is 
thus  again  fulfilled,  and  the  little  child  leads  the 
state  as  well  as  the  household.  And  all  this  is 
done  not  merely  from  motives  of  self-preservation. 
The  state  is  prompted  by  a  more  humane  and  a 
more  spiritual  purpose,  in  thus  assuming  and  ex- 
tending the  office  of  the  parent.  One  of  the  high- 
est functions  which  modern  governments  exercise  is 
that  of  opening  to  every  child  within  their  limits 
the  avenues  of  knowledge  and  of  that  power  which 
knowledge  gives. 

These  thoughts  spring  naturally  and  freshly  to 
mind  at  each  recurring  Christmas  season.  For  the 
influence  of  childhood  on  the  thought  and  life  of 
the  world  is  largely  due  to  the  teachings  of  Jesus. 
He  was,  as  has  been  justly  said,  "the  first  great 
teacher  of  men  who  showed  a  genuine  sympathy 
for  childhood.     He  was  perhaps  the  only  teacher 


Leadership  of  Little  Children     219 

of  antiquity  who  cared  for  childhood,  as  such. 
Plato  treats  of  children  and  their  games,  but  he 
treats  them  as  elements  not  to  be  left  out  in  con- 
structing society.  They  are  not  to  be  neglected 
because  they  will  inevitably  come  to  be  men  and 
women.  But  Jesus  was  the  first  who  loved  child- 
hood for  the  sake  of  childhood.  The  ancients  es- 
teemed it  their  first  duty  to  put  away  childish 
things,  but  Jesus  in  seeking  to  bring  about  a  new 
and  higher  development  of  character,  perceived 
that  there  were  elements  of  character  in  childhood 
which  were  to  be  preserved  in  the  highest  man- 
hood. He  saw  that  a  man  must  indeed  set  back 
again  toward  the  simplicity  and  innocence  of  child- 
hood, if  he  would  be  truly  a  man.  Until  Jesus 
Christ,  the  world  had  little  place  for  childhood  in 
its  thoughts.  When  He  said,  '  Of  such  is  the 
kingdom  of  heaven,'  it  was  a  revelation." 

And  yet  it  is  not  merely  in  this  general  way  that 
Isaiah's  prophecy  has  been  fulfilled.  There  has  been 
on  earth  one  little  child  toward  whom  the  thoughts  of 
the  world  turn  as  they  do  not  to  any  other,  and  who 
has  led  it  to  the  highest  and  most  precious  things 
which  it  has  yet  attained.  It  is  a  fact  as  glorious 
as  it  is  full  of  mystery,  that  God,  becoming  in- 
carnate in  the  world,  should  have  entered  human 
life  in  the  person  of  the  Babe  of  Bethlehem,  and 
the  Boy  of  Nazareth.  That  little  child  around 
whose  rude  bed  the  shepherds  gathered,  while  over 
it  the  angels  sang  their  Christmas  hymn,  leads  us 


220  Life  Indeed 

at  once  to  new  thoughts  of  God.  How  wonderful 
was  His  condescension,  in  thus  taking  upon  Him 
our  nature,  not  in  its  greatness  but  in  its  weakness, 
not  in  the  maturity  of  its  powers  but  in  the  utter 
helplessness  of  infancy  !  How  thoroughly  did  He 
thus  identify  Himself  with  humanity,  passing 
through  all  the  stages  of  human  growth  and  expe- 
rience, from  infancy  to  manhood,  from  the  manger 
to  the  cross  !  What  consecration  is  given  to  all 
our  homes  by  the  presence  of  the  Son  of  God  in 
the  humble  home  of  the  Nazarene  carpenter ! 
What  a  supreme  benediction  has  come  upon  mother- 
hood from  her  to  whom  this  priceless  gift  of  God 
was  sent !  How  all  infancy  is  set  hereafter  in  a 
sacredness,  which  makes  forever  impossible  the  in- 
difference and  cruelty  which  were  shown  toward  it 
in  the  centuries  which  preceded  the  advent  of 
Christ !  If  the  Lord  had  come  from  heaven  to 
earth  in  a  chariot  of  cloud  or  fire,  and  had  first  ap- 
peared as  a  man  moving  about  among  men.  He 
would  not  have  so  glorified  our  human  nature,  as 
when  He  assumed  it  in  the  unconsciousness  and 
helplessness  of  infancy,  and  carried  it  forward 
through  childhood  to  youth,  and  through  youth  to 
manhood,  coming  thus  into  closest  relation  with 
every  successive  period  of  life.  The  old  church- 
father  Irenseus  shows  that  the  spirit  of  Christmas- 
day  was  not  unknown  even  in  the  second  century, 
when  he  says  of  the  Lord  that  *'  He  sanctified 
every  age  by  that  period  corresponding  to  it  which 


Leadership  of  Little  Children     221 

belonged  to  Himself.  For  He  came  to  save  all  by 
means  of  Himself, — all,  I  say,  who  through  Him 
are  born  again  to  God, — infants  and  children,  and 
boys,  and  young  men  and  old  men.  He  therefore 
passed  through  every  age,  becoming  an  infant  for 
infants,  thus  sanctifying  infancy ;  a  child  for  chil- 
dren, thus  sanctifying  this  age ;  being  at  the  same 
time  made  to  all  an  example  of  piety,  righteous- 
ness and  submission." 

And  so,  for  another  thing,  the  childhood  of 
Jesus  leads  us  to  see  what  childhood  should  always 
be.  We  have  indeed  no  record  of  the  boyhood  and 
youth  that  were  passed  in  the  rude  and  perhaps 
squalid  village  among  the  mountains  of  Galilee, 
where  Jesus  grew  up.  And  yet  we  are  hardly  more 
sure  of  what  His  manhood  was,  than  of  what  His 
childhood  must  have  been.  It  must  have  been 
pure,  it  must  have  been  gentle,  it  must  have  been 
loving  and  helpful.  It  cannot  have  been  lacking 
in  courage.  It  was  certainly  marked  by  filial  obe- 
dience. There  was  in  it  the  same  firm  resistance 
of  evil  which  was  manifest  in  later  years.  It  did 
not  disdain  or  shirk  the  humblest  duties  belonging 
to  a  life  of  toil.  It  won  the  love  of  brothers  and 
sisters,  of  neighbors  and  friends;  and  with  the 
growing  sense  of  the  great  career  appointed  for 
Him  by  His  Father  in  heaven,  for  thirty  years  this 
young  man  of  Nazareth  was  willing  to  be  known 
only  as  the  carpenter's  son.  All  beautiful  traits  of 
boyhood  and  youth  were  certainly  collected  and 


222  Life  Indeed 

embodied  in  Him.  And  so  the  silent  years  of  ob- 
scurity and  of  growth  become  not  less  suggestive 
to  us  than  the  years  of  public  activity  which  fol- 
lowed them.  He  who  has  given  to  the  world  its 
only  type  of  a  perfect  manhood,  has  reminded  us 
as  well  of  what  childhood  may  be. 

Another  thing  which  instantly  follows  from  this, 
as  a  practical  lesson  of  the  childhood  of  Jesus,  is 
that  no  little  child  is  too  young  to  be  a  Christian. 
It  may  perhaps  seem  to  those  of  you  who  are 
children,  as  if  you  could  not  copy  the  example  of 
the  great  Teacher  and  Prophet,  who  wrought  so 
many  miracles  and  said  so  many  wonderful  things. 
But  think  of  Him  as  He  was  in  the  home  of  Joseph 
and  Mary;  a  little  child,  a  growing  boy,  a  youth 
engaged  in  His  earthly  father's  business,  as  well  as 
in  that  of  His  Father  in  heaven  ;  diligent,  truthful, 
loving  and  faithful;  pure  in  thought  and  feeling 
and  purpose ;  and  remember  that  He  was  once  at 
precisely  the  same  age  at  which  you  now  are,  and 
if  you  follow  the  child  Jesus,  you  too  will  deserve 
to  be  called  His  disciple.  Put  yourself,  as  it  were, 
even  now  in  His  company ;  grow  up  with  Him  as 
the  years  add  themselves  to  one  another  in  your 
life,  and  it  may  be  that  you  will  never  know  when 
you  became  a  Christian,  because  you  will  always 
have  been  His  companion  and  friend. 

Another  thing  which  is  suggested,  to  us  by  this 
train  of  reflection,  and  which  each  return  of  the 
Chri:,tmas  time  should    impress  on  us  anew,  is  the 


Leadership  of  Little  Children     223 

duty  of  looking  after  and  saving  the  children. 
The  work  that  we  do,  or  try  to  do,  for  the  moral 
and  spiritual  reformation  of  men  and  women 
around  us,  is  often  discouraging  and  apparently 
fruitless ;  but  work  done  for  the  young  never  fails 
of  its  reward.  And  here  is  our  hope,  our  one  hope, 
of  reforming  society  and  bringing  the  world  under 
the  power  of  Christian  truth.  An  impression  for 
good  or  for  evil  made  on  the  mind  of  a  little  child, 
is  never  effaced.  **  In  our  great  museums,"  as  a 
well-known  English  writer  says,  *'  you  see  stone  slabs 
with  the  marks  of  rain  that  fell  hundreds  of  years 
before  Adam  lived,  and  the  footprint  of  some  wild 
bird  that  passed  over  the  beach  in  those  old,  old 
times.  The  passing  shower  and  the  light  foot  left 
their  prints  on  the  soft  sediment.  Then  ages  went 
on  and  it  has  hardened  into  stone.  And  there 
they  remain  and  will  remain  forevermore.  That  is 
like  a  man's  spirit ;  in  the  childish  days  so  soft,  so 
susceptible  to  all  impressions,  so  joyous  to  receive 
new  ideas,  treasuring  them  up,  gathering  them  all 
into  itself,  retaining  them  all  forever.  And  then  as 
years  go  on,  habit,  the  growth  of  the  soul  into 
steadiness  and  power,  and  many  other  reasons  be- 
side, gradually  make  us  less  and  less  capable  of 
being  profoundly  and  permanently  influenced  by 
anything  outside  of  us,  so  that  the  process  from 
childhood  to  manhood  is  a  process  of  getting  less 
impressible."  **  There  is  little  hope,"  says  an  old 
writer,   ''of  children  who  are  educated  wickedly. 


224  Life  Indeed 

If  the  dye  have  been  in  the  wool,  it  is  hard  to  get 
it  out  of  the  cloth."  This  lesson  is  certainly  too 
obvious  to  be  mistaken.  If  we  are  to  extend  the 
kingdom  of  the  Master  in  the  world,  we  must  seek 
first  of  all  to  bring  the  children  under  its  light  and 
power. 

And  finally,  there  comes  to  us  from  the  manger 
at  Bethlehem  and  from  the  home  at  Nazareth,  the 
clearest  possible  revelation  of  the  true  spirit  of  the 
Christian  religion.  It  seems  as  if  Jesus  Himself 
had  become  a  little  child  in  order  to  give  emphasis 
to  His  own  later  teaching  concerning  the  absolute 
necessity  of  the  childlike  spirit  in  those  who  would 
become  members  of  His  kingdom.  He  came  at  an 
age  in  the  life  of  the  world  which  appears  in  some 
respects  childish  in  comparison  with  that  in  which 
we  live.  But  His  words  and  His  influence  were  not 
for  that  day  only,  they  were  for  all  time.  Now,  as 
of  old,  he  who  would  see  the  kingdom  of  God,  must 
be  born  again  and  enter  it  as  a  little  child.  He 
who  would  do  the  work  of  God  in  the  world,  must 
do  it  with  the  singleness  of  faith  and  of  purpose 
which  are  characteristic  of  childhood.  The  highest 
attainment  which  can  be  made  in  Christian  charac- 
ter on  earth,  under  the  training  of  God's  truth  and 
His  Spirit,  is  the  recovery,  as  life  draws  near  its 
end,  of  the  purity  which  marked  its  beginning. 
And  when  we  enter  the  kingdom  overhead,  if  we 
ever  do  enter  it,  it  will  be  as  when  a  little  child  is 
born  into  an  earthly  home.     It  will  be  the  entrance 


Leadership  of  Little  Children     225 

upon  a  life  full  of  wonder  and  mystery,  a  life  of 
growth,  a  life  of  ever-advancing  knowledge,  a  life 
unfolding  beneath  the  Father's  eye,  in  the  safe  and 
loving  shelter  of  the  Father's  house. 


THE   NECESSITY  OF  IMMORTALITY 


This  mortal  must  put  on  immortality. — i  Cor. 
XV.  53- 


XII 

THE  NECESSITY  OF  IMMORTALITY 

It  is  not  altogether  easy  to  follow  the  apostle's 
argument  in  this  magnificent  chapter.  We  do  not 
even  commonly  feel  its  force  as  an  argument,  so 
powerful  is  it  as  a  revelation  of  things  which  the 
human  mind  had  never  before  conceived.  And 
yet  it  is  an  argument,  designed  to  prove  that  the 
life  of  man  must  be  continued  under  new  condi- 
tions,-in  other  spheres,  beyond  the  grave. 

Our  belief  in  such  a  life  awaiting  us  rests  on 
various  considerations.  We  find  it,  for  one  thing, 
an  almost  universal  belief  among  mankind ;  and  we 
justly  argue  that  what  men  have  always  and  every- 
where accepted  as  true,  cannot  be  a  total  illusion. 
We  find  within  ourselves  a  more  or  less  distinct  an- 
ticipation of  a  life  that  is  to  follow  death.  It  is 
contrary,  indeed,  to  all  the  testimony  which  comes 
to  us  through  our  senses.  No  clear  evidence  of  it 
may  ever  have  been  presented  to  our  minds.  It  is 
often  extremely  difficult  to  make  it  real  to  our 
thought,  and  we  feel  the  force  of  the  arguments 
which  tend  to  disprove  it.  Yet  there  are  very  few 
of  us  who  would  be  ready  to  say  that  they  do  not 
believe  in  it.  The  expectation  of  it  does  not  seem 
to  be  due  to  inheritance  and  early  training,  or 
to  the  influence  of  the  faith  of  those  around  us  on 
229 


230  Life  Indeed 

ourselves.  It  seems  rather  to  be  innate  within  us, 
to  be  instinctive  in  our  souls ;  and  we  cannot  think 
that  there  is  actually  nothing  which  corresponds  to 
it, — that  it  is  a  deceptive  dream. 

On  the  contrary,  if  our  deepest  and  most  persist- 
ent feelings  will  not  permit  us  to  accept  annihila- 
tion as  our  destiny,  our  reason  also  seems  to  de- 
mand another  life,  by  which  the  evident  incom- 
pleteness of  the  present  shall  be  rounded  out,  its 
mysteries  solved,  and  its  contradictions  reconciled. 
There  would  seem  to  be  no  order  or  intelligence  in 
the  course  of  earthly  affairs ;  it  would  appear  rea- 
sonable to  question  the  wisdom  and  goodness  and 
the  moral  government  of  God,  if  processes  that  are 
here  begun  are  not  elsewhere  carried  forward,  and 
if  evil  which  is  so  often  triumphant  in  this  world  is 
not  in  another  conquered  by  good.  And  then,  re- 
ceiving the  Bible,  as  we  do,  as  the  word  of  God, 
intended  to  reveal  to  us  what  we  cannot  discover 
for  ourselves,  we  find  the  truth  of  immortality  shin- 
ing, faintly  indeed  but  really,  from  the  pages  of  the 
Old  Testament,  and  giving  a  celestial  splendor  to 
the  pages  of  the  New.  A  future  life  is  not  only 
implied  in  the  teaching  of  the  Lord  and  His  apos- 
tles, it  is  distinctly  asserted  by  them.  Some  things 
are  told  us  in  regard  to  it  which,  if  we  respect  their 
authority,  we  must  accept  as  true.  No  one  who 
believes  the  Christian  Scriptures  can  doubt  that  the 
life  begun  in  this  world  is  continued  in  the  world 
unseen. 


The  Necessity  of  Immortality    231 

But  in  this  wonderful  chapter  of  St.  Paul's  epis- 
tle, which  is  so  often  read  in  that  solemn  moment 
in  which  we  bid  farewell  to  those  whom  death  has 
taken  from  us,  to  which  we  so  often  turn  for  conso- 
lation and  for  light  in  the  hour  of  sore  bereave- 
ment, and  which  was  so  evidently  written  under  an 
inspiration  from  above, — in  this  most  remarkable 
passage  of  all  his  writings,  a  very  different  reason 
is  given  for  the  belief  in  a  life  beyond  the  grave. 
''This  mortal  must  put  on  immortality,"  he  says. 
And  why  *'  must  "  ?  Because  another  life  is  neces- 
sary to  the  completion  of  the  work  of  Christ.  The 
relation  of  every  believer  to  his  Saviour,  St.  Paul 
declares,  implies  development ;  the  work  of  Christ 
within  him  is  not  completed  when  he  has  given 
himself  to  Christ  and  has  accepted  Christ  as  his 
Redeemer  and  Lord.  It  is  then  only  begun.  The 
germ  of  a  new  life  is  implanted  in  his  soul,  and 
that  life  is  destined  to  develop,  until  finally  his 
whole  nature  shall  be  renewed  and  his  assimilation 
to  Christ  be  perfect.  But  this  does  not  take  place, 
it  cannot  take  place,  within  the  limits  of  the  pres- 
ent life.  It  requires  another  life  beyond  the  grave. 
It  involves  a  change  in  the  conditions  and  mode  of 
existence,  by  which  the  fetters  of  the  flesh  shall  be 
cast  off,  and  a  larger  career  be  opened  to  the  eman- 
cipated spirit.  With  the  beginnings  of  this  great 
change  we  are  all  familiar.  We  are  conscious  of 
them  as  they  take  place  within  ourselves.  It  is  fol- 
lowed by  a  gradual  and  steady  growth  toward  the 


232  Life  Indeed 

image  of  Him  whose  name  we  bear  and  whose 
Spirit  is  at  work  within  us.  And  now  the  apostle 
says  that  this  development  is  not  arrested  by  death. 
It  goes  forward  forever.  But  its  future  progress  is 
determined  by  its  present  tendency.  It  is  like  the 
growths  of  the  natural  world, — a  development 
within  the  limits  of  kind.  And  for  its  completion 
it  requires  not  merely  that  the  soul  should  be  im- 
mortal, but  that  the  whole  man — body,  soul,  and 
spirit — should  be  translated  from  this  world  to  an- 
other, where  his  progress  may  be  unhindered  and 
unending.  When  this  is  realized,  then  shall  be 
brought  to  pass  the  saying  that  is  written,  ''Death 
is  swallowed  up  in  victory."  The  work  for  the 
sake  of  which  the  Son  of  God  became  incarnate 
will  be  fully  accomplished.  For  this  reason  it  is 
that  "  this  corruptible  must  put  on  incorruption  and 
this  mortal  must  put  on  immortality  "  ;  not  because 
the  life  of  the  human  soul  is  indestructible,  or  be- 
cause it  is  fragmentary  and  imperfect  within  the 
limits  of  the  present  world,  but  because  that  which 
Christ  has  undertaken  to  do  for  it  cannot  be  done 
except  as  its  existence  is  continued  into  the  long 
ages  of  the  future. 

I  have  no  intention  of  attempting  to  follow  out 
into  its  details  this  great  argument  of  the  apostle. 
It  is  certainly  worthy,  as  an  argument,  to  be  most 
thoughtfully  pondered,  and  I  am  persuaded  that  its 
force  is  often  missed  even  by  those  who  are  most 
familiar  with  his  words  and  who  have  derived  the 


The  Necessity  of  Immortality    233 

greatest  comfort  from  them.  But  there  are  cer- 
tainly one  or  two  thoughts  suggested  by  his  course 
of  reasoning  which  might  well  find  a  permanent 
place  in  all  our  minds. 

The  first  of  them  is  this :  that  in  order  to  gain 
any  true  understanding  of  our  own  nature,  of  the 
purposes  and  experiences  of  the  present  life,  and  of 
the  destiny  awaiting  us  hereafter,  it  is  necessary 
that  we  should  clearly  apprehend  the  nature  and 
the  office  of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ.  The  tendency 
of  Christian  thought  at  the  present  day  is  to  dwell 
largely  on  His  humanity.  Christ  as  a  teacher,  as 
an  example,  as  a  sympathizing  friend,  as  a  patient 
sufferer,  as  the  greatest,  wisest,  and  most  lovely  of 
mankind, — so  it  is  that  we  perhaps  most  often  re- 
gard Him.  It  is  most  comforting  and  helpful  thus 
to  be  able  to  see  Jesus  as  He  was  seen  by  those 
who  walked  at  His  side  and  sat  at  His  feet  and 
wept  in  helpless  sorrow  under  the  shadow  of  His 
cross.  It  has  no  doubt  done  much  to  bring  Chris- 
tian theology  out  of  the  realm  of  abstract  specula- 
tion, and  to  make  it  a  living  reality.  It  has  made 
us  feel  afresh  the  surpassing  beauty  of  a  holy  life. 
It  has  taught  us  priceless  lessons  of  sympathy  with 
one  another,  while  it  has  encouraged  us  to  go  to 
Him  for  forgiveness  and  for  help,  with  the  same 
trustful  confidence  which  He  awakened  among 
the  suffering  and  the  sinful  whom  He  healed  and 
pardoned.  We  cannot  possibly  get  too  near  to  the 
Christ  of  the  gospels.     We  cannot  possibly  lay  too 


234  Life  Indeed 

strong  an  emphasis  on  the  fact  that  He  took  our 
nature  upon  Him,  and  that  He  was  in  all  points 
tempted  as  we  ourselves  are  tempted  now.  Never 
again,  as  long  as  time  lasts,  can  the  world  lose 
sight  of  the  man  Christ  Jesus. 

And  yet  it  is  a  very  striking  fact  that  the  great- 
est of  the  apostles,  the  chief  interpreter  and  expo- 
nent and  champion  of  the  Christian  religion,  says 
very  little  about  the  earthly  life  and  about  the  hu- 
man nature  of  our  Lord.  What  he  saw  in  Him 
chiefly  was  the  fulness  of  the  godhead.  He  was 
to  him  the  Son  of  God  sent  down  from  heaven. 
He  came  in  all  the  glory  of  His  divine  nature  and 
dwelt  for  a  little  while  among  us.  He  came  to 
reveal  the  Father's  heart;  He  came  to  do  the 
Father's  will ;  He  came  to  recover  and  restore  the 
lost  children  of  His  Father,  and  to  reestablish  in 
their  obedient  souls  His  Father's  just  authority. 
His  life  and  death  were  the  expression  of  the  self- 
sacrificing  love  of  God.  And  by  giving  Himself 
for  the  redemption  of  the  world.  He  made  Himself 
the  King  of  the  world.  His  presence  among  men 
was  not  an  incident  in  their  history,  it  was  the  ful- 
filment of  God's  eternal  purpose.  And  His  depar- 
ture from  the  world  was  not  the  end  of  His  connec- 
tion with  it.  It  was  His  exaltation  to  the  throne  of 
sovereign  authority  and  power.  King  of  the  world, 
Lord  of  angels  and  men, — by  virtue  of  His  essen- 
tial oneness  with  His  Father  and  of  His  atoning 
life  and  death, — such  was  Christ  as  St.  Paul  con- 


The  Necessity  of  Immortality    235 

ceived  of  Him,  or  rather,  as  He  had  revealed  Him- 
self to  His  apostle.  And  that  conception  of  Christ 
was  the  central  fact  in  St.  Paul's  philosophy  of  his- 
tory. It  was  the  key  which  unlocked  for  him  the 
secrets  of  the  future.  When  he  wrote,  ''Of  Him 
and  through  Him  and  unto  Him  are  all  things," 
he  showed  us  plainly  in  what  relation  Christ  stood 
before  his  mind  to  the  history  of  the  past,  and  to  the 
still  unenacted  history  of  the  ages  to  come.  Every- 
thing in  heaven  and  on  earth  revolved  about  and 
centred  in  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ.  If  apart  from 
Him  nothing  could  be  accomplished,  apart  from 
Him  nothing  could  be  understood. 

Now  it  hardly  needs  to  be  said  that  this  is  a 
much  grander  and  truer  way  than  the  other  to 
think  of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ.  It  is  undoubtedly 
the  way  in  which  He  thought  of  Himself.  It  is 
the  way  in  which  He  was  believed  in  and  wor- 
shiped and  trusted  by  those  to  whom  the  founding 
of  His  church  on  earth  was  committed.  And  it  is 
the  way  in  which  He  has  made  Himself  known  to 
the  noblest  and  most  truly  inspired  souls  in  every 
age.  He  who  has  this  exalted  thought  of  the 
character,  person,  and  office  of  the  Lord,  can  alone 
understand  what  was  done  on  earth  in  anticipation 
of  His  coming,  and  what  He  has  Himself  been  do- 
ing through  the  continuing  activity  of  His  Spirit 
among  men.  The  history  of  the  past  is  a  hopeless 
tangle  except  as  you  see  one  increasing  purpose 
running  through  it,  and  recognize  that  purpose  as 


236  Life   Indeed 

the  redemption  of  the  world  from  the  power  of  evil 
by  the  cross  and  the  Spirit  of  Christ.  The  tmnul- 
tuous  movements  of  mankind  at  the  present  hour 
have  no  more  meaning  than  the  tossing  of  an  angry- 
sea,  except  as  you  recognize  the  working  out  by 
means  of  them  of  the  same  mighty  and  gracious  plan. 
Here  is  the  solution  of  the  mysteries  by  which  we 
are  so  often  baffled  in  our  own  personal  experience, 
— the  disappointments  and  sorrows  which  sometimes 
take  the  joy  and  hope  out  of  our  souls.  And  here 
is  the  only  possible  clue  to  the  unsolved  problems 
that  confront  us,  and  the  only  sure  basis  of  hope 
for  the  future  welfare  of  mankind.  Christ  over  all, 
everywhere  active,  everywhere  working  for  the 
gracious  end  which  brought  Him  from  the  heavens 
to  the  earth, — this  is  the  one  transcendent  fact  in 
the  history  of  mankind,  as  it  is  now  going  forward 
and  is  to  go  forward  forever.  Small  events  as  well 
as  great  ones  are  explained  by  it.  Humble  lives 
as  well  as  splendid  ones  are  rich  or  poor  according 
to  their  relation  to  it.  And  he  only  is  competent 
to  judge  of  what  has  taken  place  in  the  past  and  is 
taking  place  to-day,  or  to  forecast  the  yet  unreal- 
ized future,  who  sees  that  the  supreme  force  by 
which  the  life  of  the  race  has  hitherto  been  guided 
and  its  future  destiny  is  yet  to  be  determined  is  the 
sovereign  will  of  Him  who  was  once  suspended  on 
the  cross  and  to  whom  now  all  authority  both  in 
heaven  and  on  earth  is  given. 

Another  thought  suggested  by  the  apostle's  words 


The  Necessity  of  Immortality    237 

is  this  :  that  the  spiritual  hfe  of  men  is  one  of  con- 
tinuous development,  and  that  that  development, 
begun  here  on  earth,  is  to  go  on  forever.  It 
is  not  very  many  years  since  the  Christian  world 
was  startled  and  alarmed  by  the  proclamation  of 
the  theory  of  evolution.  Men  looked  at  one  an- 
other in  dismay,  and  said,  *'If  it  is  true,  then  the 
authority  of  the  Bible  is  destroyed,  the  Christian 
religion  must  be  given  up."  And  with  the  utmost 
vehemence  they  maintained  that  it  could  not  be 
true.  A  calmer  temper  and  a  more  just  discern- 
ment in  regard  to  the  matter  now  prevail  among 
us.  Scientific  thinkers  with  few  exceptions  have 
adopted  the  theory,  and  Christian  thinkers  have 
discovered  that  it  not  only  does  not  contradict  the 
teachings  of  the  Bible,  but  furnishes  new  evidence 
of  the  power,  wisdom,  and  goodness  of  God.  And 
yet  while  all  this  hot  discussion  was  going  on,  we 
had,  and  were  reading  every  day,  in  this  fifteenth 
chapter  of  First  Corinthians  the  most  impressive 
and  the  most  daring  statement  of  the  law  of  evolu- 
tion which  has  ever  been  put  into  words.  ''That 
which  thou  sowest  is  not  quickened  except  it  die ; 
and  that  which  thou  sowest,  thou  sowest  not  that 
body  which  shall  be,  but  bare  grain,  it  may  chance 
of  wheat  or  of  some  other  grain ;  but  God  giveth 
it  a  body  as  it  hath  pleased  Him,  and  to  every 
seed  his  own  body."  This  is  the  process  of  de- 
velopment in  nature — the  evolution  of  the  plant 
and  the  flower  from  the  seed,  within  the  limit  of 


238  Life  Indeed 

species,  under  the  operation  of  the  ever-present 
energy  of  God.  The  apostle  might  have  gone  on 
to  point  out  other  appUcations  of  the  same  prin- 
ciple, in  the  development  of  higher  types  of  life 
from  lower  ones,  in  the  animal  and  vegetable  world, 
within  similar  limits  and  under  the  same  vivifying 
power.  He  might  have  applied  it  to  society,  and 
then  we  should  have  had  from  him  a  statement  of 
the  great  principle  of  social  evolution,  by  which 
the  race  has  been  gradually  elevated  and  the  civili- 
zation of  mankind  advanced.  He  does  not  do 
this,  but  he  does  more  than  this.  He  applies  it  to 
the  moral  and  spiritual  life  of  men.  He  asserts 
that  this  is  the  law  under  which  each  of  us  is  liv- 
ing, and  by  virtue  of  which  each  of  us  is  to  come 
at  last  to  the  fulness  of  his  destiny.  Out  of  the 
germ  implanted  by  God's  Spirit  in  your  soul  and 
mine  a  new  life  springs,  which  cannot  attain  its 
full  completeness  until  the  bonds  by  which  it  is 
now  imprisoned  have  been  burst  by  death  and  it 
gains  the  freedom  of  higher  spheres  for  its  un- 
limited and  endless  progress.  As  clearly  as  any- 
thing can  be  stated,  this  is  what  St.  Paul  maintains 
in  this  most  sublime  passage  of  his  writings.  It  is 
not  merely  that  this  world  is  too  small  and  time  too 
short  for  the  activity  of  such  a  being  as  the  incarnate 
Son  of  God.  It  is  that  the  earth  is  too  small  and 
time  too  short  for  the  full  development  of  the  spirit- 
ual nature  which  every  man  possesses.  If  Christ 
needs  eternity  for  the  accomplishment  of  His  work, 


The  Necessity  of  Immortality    239 

we  too  need  eternity  for  the  attainment  of  all  that 
we  are  designed  to  reach.  Like  the  seed  which 
bursts  its  hard  envelope,  that  the  life  within  it  may 
unfold  itself  in  a  new  and  nobkr  form,  so  these 
bodies  of  ours  must  be  cast  off  that  the  life  in  us 
may  come  to  completer  exhibition  and  to  a  more 
glorious  development.  And  all  this  reveals  the 
operation  of  the  same  divine  Spirit  from  which  all 
life  proceeds.  This  is  the  method  of  God's  work- 
ing in  nature,  in  society,  and  in  the  personal  ex- 
perience of  every  one  of  us.  One  great  divine  law 
is  over  the  whole  creation.  It  is  this  law,  the  mere 
name  of  which  sometimes  alarms  us,  of  the  develop- 
ment of  the  higher  from  the  lower,  until  the  highest 
possibility  shall  be  at  last  attained.  And  the  death 
of  the  lower  is  incidental  to  this — an  essential  con- 
dition of  it.  It  is  not  the  end  of  life,  it  is  the 
opening  of  the  door  into  a  larger,  nobler  life.  The 
apostle  Paul  was  of  course  a  stranger  to  the  scien- 
tific knowledge,  as  well  as  to  the  scientific  theories, 
of  modern  days;  but  this  great  truth  he  clearly 
saw,  and  in  this  wonderful  passage  he  states  it  with 
equal  boldness  and  power. 

One  other  thing,  which  I  have  already  hinted  at, 
is  plainly  taught  us  in  these  words.  It  is  that  the 
development  of  the  human  spirit  in  the  life  await- 
ing it  hereafter  is  along  the  lines  which  it  has  been 
pursuing  during  its  career  on  earth.  We  often 
think  of  death  as  changing  everything,  not  only  the 
outward  conditions  of  life  but  its   essential  char- 


24:0  Life  Indeed 

acter.  We  expect  it  to  have  a  sort  of  magical 
effect  upon  us,  transforming  what  was  low  and  base 
into  something  pure  and  perfect.  It  cannot  be  so, 
if  this  doctrine  of  development  is  true.  ''  There 
is  a  natural  body,"  says  St.  Paul,  ''and  there  is  a 
spiritual  body.  That  was  not  first  which  is  spirit- 
ual, but  that  which  is  natural,  and  afterward  that 
which  is  spiritual.  As  we  have  borne  the  image  of 
the  earthy,  we  shall  also  bear  the  image  of  the 
heavenly.  The  dead  shall  be  raised,  incorruptible, 
and  we  shall  be  changed."  Yes,  but  we  shall  still 
be  ourselves.  It  is  ^Ms  corruptible  which  must  put 
on  incorruption,  and  ^/lis  mortal  which  must  put  on 
immortality.  ''To  every  seed  its  own  body." 
The  life  of  the  world  to  come  is  the  same  life  that 
is  in  us  now,  expanded,  exalted,  made  immortal. 
The  character  which  we  are  to  manifest  forever  is 
that  which  is  formed  within  us  and  revealed  by  us 
here  on  earth.  If  it  were  not  so,  then  this  present 
life  would  stand  in  no  relation  to  the  life  beyond 
the  grave.  If  it  were  not  so,  there  would  have 
been  no  reason  why  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  should 
come  to  this  world  and  should  suffer  and  die  here. 
The  cross  might  as  well  have  been  set  up  on  the 
other  side  of  the  river  of  death.  If  it  were  not  so, 
there  would  be  no  reason  why  the  gospel  should  be 
preached  to  living  men.  It  might  just  as  well  be 
preached  to  disembodied  spirits,  if  it  is  not  the  life 
we  are  now  living  which  determines  the  condition 
and  the  character  of  the  life  which  is  to  come.     It 


The  Necessity  of  Immortality    241 

is  a  tremendous  fact,  but  it  is  a  fact,  that  we  are  in 
eternity  already.  We  are  already  started  on  that 
career  which  is  to  have  no  end.  As  our  faces  are 
now  set,  so  we  are  forever  to  travel, — upward  or 
downward,  toward  God  or  away  from  Him,  toward 
ever  loftier  heights  of  purity  and  happiness,  or  ever 
deeper  depths  of  sin  and  shame.  This  mortal 
must  put  on  immortality ;  and  such  as  this  mortal 
now  is,  such  will  its  immortality  be.  There  is  no 
promise  of  any  moral  reformation  in  death.  For 
death  only  touches  the  body.  It  cannot  change 
the  immortal  spirit.  Not  when  we  have  passed  out 
of  earthly  conditions,  but  here  and  now,  is  the 
question  of  our  eternal  destiny  decided. 

It  sometimes  seems  as  if  the  fact  that  this  mortal 
must  put  on  immortality,  sooner  or  later,  and  per- 
haps very  soon,  made  our  present  life  a  thing  of 
little  consequence.  Why  should  we  care  very 
much  what  we  do  or  do  not  do,  what  we  gain  or 
lose,  what  we  enjoy  or  suffer,  when  at  any  moment 
we  are  liable  to  pass  out  of  this  brief  existence  into 
that  which  will  never  end  ?  Yes,  it  is  true  that  this 
earthly  life  is  of  little  consequence  compared  with 
the  life  everlasting.  If  you  are  straining  every 
nerve  to  make  money,  to  obtain  power  over  your 
fellow-men,  to  secure  new  opportunities  of  enjoy- 
ment, to  gain  a  social  position  which  you  can  keep 
only  for  a  few  years  at  the  utmost,  it  is  not  worth 
while,  in  view  of  the  fact  that  your  true  life  is  not 
on  this  side  of  the  grave  but  on  tlie  other.     It  is 


242  Life  Indeed 

not  worth  while  to  suffer  yourself  to  be  tormented 
by  envy  of  those  who  are  more  fortunate  than  you 
are ;  or  to  be  filled  with  anger  and  hatred  toward 
those  who  have  treated  you  ill ;  or  to  be  discour- 
aged by  difficulties,  or  restive  under  restraints,  or 
morose  or  petulant  under  disappointment,  or  heart- 
broken under  great  affliction.  Remember  that  this 
mortal  must  soon  put  on  immortality,  and  that  then 
all  these  things  will  be  forever  left  behind.  What 
do  you  care  now  for  the  trials  which  seemed  so  in- 
tolerable when  you  were  a  child  ?  When  you  be- 
come an  immortal,  you  will  think  and  care  still  less 
about  a  thousand  things  which  now  engross  your 
mind  and  oppress  your  spirit.  In  this  sense  the 
present  life  is  of  small  account  compared  with  that 
which  is  to  come. 

But  on  the  other  hand,  it  is  of  inconceivable 
consequence  in  view  of  its  relation  to  the  future  life, 
when  you  remember  that  what  you  are  now  doing 
determines  your  character,  and  that  your  character 
determines  your  destiny.  Even  trifling  acts  thus 
acquire  immense  significance.  It  is  because  we  so 
constantly  forget  that  we  are  laying  the  foundations 
on  which  we  are  to  build  forever  ;  that  we  are  sow- 
ing the  seeds  of  a  harvest  which  we  are  to  reap  in 
the  centuries  to  come, — it  is  because  we  forget  this 
that  we  suffer  ourselves  to  be  so  absorbed  with 
things  that  do  not  profit,  and  so  indifferent  to  the 
claims  of  duty  and  of  God.  O  that  we  might  re- 
member, as  our  life  goes  on  from  day  to  day,  as  we 


The  Necessity  of  Immortality    243 

move  about  among  our  fellow-men,  as  we  go  to  our 
business  and  return  to  our  homes,  as  one  by  one  we 
meet  the  temptations  and  the  opportunities  which 
come  crowding  upon  us  hour  by  hour, — O  that  we 
might  say  to  ourselves  from  time  to  time  :  *'  I  too 
must  put  on  immortality.  This  is  not  life ;  it  is 
only  the  preparation  for  life.  I  am  a  child  at 
school.  The  career  assigned  me,  the  work  I  am  to 
do,  lies  all  before  me.  How  soon  I  must  take  it  up 
I  do  not  know.  But  I  do  know  that  I  am  soon  to 
put  on  immortality.  I  am  to  stand  with  those  who 
have  passed  over  their  earthly  course  before  me  and 
have  now  entered  into  life.  I  am  to  see  God.  I 
am  to  appear  in  the  presence  of  Christ.  I  am  to 
be  admitted  to  the  society  of  the  pure  and  blessed 
spirits  who  are  already  living  the  immortal  life. 
How  may  I  fit  myself  to  join  them  ?  How  may  I 
become  worthy  to  share  in  the  service  in  which  they 
are  engaged  ?  God  help  me  to  do  this  day's  work 
aright !  God  shield  me  from  the  temptations  to  evil 
by  which  I  shall  otherwise  be  surely  overcome,  so 
that  when  the  hour  strikes  for  my  entrance  upon  the 
life  awaiting  me,  I  may  be  ready  for  the  summons, 
and  be  prepared  to  leave  what  is  mortal  behind  me, 
and  to  go  forth  to  an  immortality  of  peace  and 
joy!" 

Then,  if  the  truth  which  is  brought  before  us  in 
these  words  of  the  apostle  is  fitted  to  impress  us 
with  the  sense  of  the  solemnity  and  sacredness  of 
life,  it  also  enables  us  to  understand  the  reason 


244  Life  Indeed 

why  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  should  come  into  this 
world  and  here  lay  down  His  life  for  its  redemption. 
The  gospel  sometimes  seems  to  us  so  mysterious 
and  wonderful  as  to  be  beyond  belief.  It  is,  in- 
deed, quite  impossible  that  men  should  have 
invented  such  a  story  and  have  wrought  out  for 
themselves  upon  the  basis  of  it  a  religion  of  such 
scope  and  grandeur  and  spiritual  power.  And  yet 
we  sometimes  say  to  ourselves,  **  Do  I  really  believe, 
can  I  really  believe,  that  Jesus  of  Nazareth  was  in 
truth  the  Son  of  God ;  that  God  Himself  was  will- 
ing to  take  my  nature  on  Him,  and  to  suffer  and 
die  for  my  salvation  ?  "  We  could  not  believe  it  if 
this  life  were  all.  It  would  be  incredible  if  the 
only  result  to  be  accomplished  by  it  were  the 
deliverance  of  men  from  the  evils  by  which  they 
are  now  afflicted,  or  even  the  establishment  of  a 
purer  and  happier  social  life  among  them  while  the 
earth  continues  to  be  their  home.  But  when  you 
remember  that  each  and  every  one  of  them  is  an 
immortal  being  with  an  endless  existence  before 
him,  with  possibiHties  of  an  unlimited  development 
into  the  likeness  of  the  Son  of  God,  then  it  is  easy 
to  understand  how  the  heart  of  God  should  have 
longed  to  rescue  and  save  them,  and  how  Christ 
should  have  been  willing  to  leave  His  place  amidst 
the  heavenly  glory  and  submit  to  the  agony  and 
shame  of  Calvary.  If  the  grandeur  of  Christ's 
nature  and  office  was  the  ground  of  the  apostle's 
firm    assurance    concerning    the  life   beyond   the 


The  Necessity  of  Immortality    245 

grave,  on  the  other  hand  the  fact  of  the  Ufe  beyond 
the  grave  makes  it  possible  for  us  to  receive,  with 
beheving  and  adoring  hearts,  the  revelation  of 
divine  love  and  mercy  which  is  made  to  us  in  His 
cross. 

There  is  surely  no  little  comfort  and  encourage- 
ment in  this  great  truth  for  those  who  are  conscious 
of  the  weakness  and  imperfectness  of  the  character 
which  they  at  present  show.  How  many  of  us  are 
there  who  are  not  often  burdened  by  the  fact  that 
we  come  so  far  short  of  the  standard  at  which  we 
are  aiming,  and  that  our  progress  toward  it  is  so 
fitful  and  so  slow?  *•'  Is  it  worth  while,"  we  some- 
times ask  ourselves,  ''to  struggle  on,  when  we  have 
thus  far  made  so  little  progress  and  when  the  goal 
of  our  hearts'  desires  is  still  so  distant?"  Ah! 
but  let  us  remember  that  we  have  yet  to  put  on 
immortality.  The  work  which  Christ  has  under- 
taken to  do  for  us,  is  not  to  be  accomplished  here. 
For  its  fulfilment  we  must  wait  till  He  shall  sum- 
mon us  to  the  spheres  of  life  into  which  He  Him- 
self has  passed.  There,  by  and  by,  we  shall 
receive  the  answer  to  our  prayers,  we  shall  attain 
the  fulfilment  of  our  hopes.  As  we  have  borne  the 
image  of  the  earthly,  we  shall  also  bear  the  image 
of  the  heavenly.  Not  only  all  sin,  but  all  im- 
perfection, will  be  left  behind.  We  shall  see  Him, 
we  shall  be  like  Him,  and  we  shall  be  satisfied. 

And  here  is  the  motive  for  unwearied,  self-deny- 
ing, lifelong  labor  for  the  salvation  of  our  fellow- 


246  Life  Indeed 

men, — the  motive  of  all  missionary  work,  the 
motive  of  all  humane  and  Christian  activity.  Not 
merely  is  it  a  blessed  thing  to  relieve  the  present 
misery  of  those  who  are  in  need ;  to  teach  them 
and  help  them  to  make  life  purer,  brighter,  and 
richer  in  enjoyment;  not  merely  does  he  deserve 
well  of  mankind,  who  does  anything  to  promote 
the  progress  of  the  world  in  knowledge,  happiness, 
and  virtue.  The  great  motive  which  appeals  to  us 
as  Christians,  as  disciples  of  the  one  divine  Master, 
as  those  who  hold  the  faith  which  was  so  splendidly 
maintained  by  the  apostle  Paul, — the  great  motive 
of  Christian  fidelity  and  zeal  is  in  the  fact  that  our 
fellow-men,  as  well  as  we,  are  immortal  beings,  for 
whom  the  life  of  this  world  is  to  be  followed  by  an 
endless  life  in  worlds  beyond.  It  is  well  to  have  a 
care  for  men's  bodies,  but  the  soul  is  of  infinitely 
greater  value  than  the  body.  And  the  greatest 
need  of  men  to-day,  in  our  own  land  and  in 
heathen  lands,  is  such  a  knowledge  of  God  as  will 
renew  their  souls  and  awaken  in  them  a  true 
spiritual  life.  It  is  on  moral  and  religious  truth 
that  all  civilization  rests,  and  we  are  trying  to  erect 
a  building  without  a  foundation,  when  we  under- 
take to  civilize  or  elevate  our  fellow-men  without 
imparting  to  them  the  truth,  as  it  has  come  to  us  by 
the  lips  and  life  of  Jesus  Christ.  Let  us  not  forget  this 
in  our  work  among  the  needy  and  ignorant  at  our 
own  doors.  Let  us  not  forget  it  when  the  call 
comes  to  help  in  sending  the  gospel  to  the  other 


The  Necessity  of  Immortality    2i7 

side  of  the  globe.  We  are  dealing  with  immortal 
beings  who,  even  while  we  are  speaking  of  them 
and  prapng  for  them,  are  swiftly  passing  to  the 
judgment-seat  of  God.  We  cannot  be  too  prompt, 
we  cannot  be  too  earnest,  in  our  efforts  to  carry  or 
to  send  to  them  the  message  of  God's  grace  in  Jesus 
Christ.  In  that  lies  the  secret  of  life  in  the  best 
and  highest  sense, — a  noble,  useful,  happy  life  on 
earth,  and  a  life  of  glory,  honor,  and  immortality 
beyond  the  grave. 


THE  PLACE  AND  THE  WAY 


And  whither  I  go  ye  know,  and  the  way  ye 
know.  Thomas  saith  unto  Him,  Lord,  we  know 
not  whither  Thou  goest,  and  how  can  we  know  the 
way  ?  Jesus  saith  unto  him,  I  am  the  way  .  .  . 
no  man  cometh  unto  the  Father  but  by  Me. — John 
xiv.  4-6. 


XIII 
THE  PLACE  AND  THE  WAY 

We  are  naturally  jealous  of  many  of  the  changes 
which  have  been  made  in  the  Revised  Version  of  the 
New  Testament,  especially  in  those  passages  which, 
like  this  chapter  and  the  following  chapters  of  St. 
John's  gospel,  are  peculiarly  familiar  and  dear  to 
all  Christian  hearts.  It  seems  almost  a  sacrilege  to 
touch  a  letter,  to  disturb  the  rhythmic  cadence  of 
a  phrase,  even  in  our  English  translation  of  them, 
which  has  come  to  have  a  sacredness  of  its  own, 
in  addition  to  that  which  belongs  to  the  original 
words,  from  the  tender  and  hallowed  associations 
with  which  it  is  invested  through  the  reverent  use 
of  centuries. 

And  yet  even  in  these  most  precious  portions  of 
God's  word,  a  change  in  the  rendering  cannot  but 
be  accepted  and  welcomed  when  it  brings  out  more 
clearly  an  important  thought  which  the  former 
version  had  obscured,  or  represents  a  truer  reading 
of  the  original  text,  where  it  has  in  some  way  be- 
come corrupted.  Thus  in  beginning  His  last  dis- 
course to  His  disciples,  it  is  almost  certain  that  our 
Lord  did  not  say,  '*Ye  believe  in  God;  believe 
also  in  Me,"  as  if  their  confidence  in  Him  were  to 
be  added  to  or  derived  from  that  reverence  for 
251 


252  Life  Indeed 

Jehovah  which  was  felt  by  every  Jew.  It  was  the 
want  of  a  true  behef  in  God,  as  their  Father  and 
His  own,  that  had  caused  the  sorrow  with  which 
their  hearts  were  filled.  And  therefore  His  com- 
mand is,  '*  Believe  in  God,  and  believe  in  Me,  as 
the  manifestation  of  God,  and  let  not  your  hearts 
be  troubled." 

In  the  words  which  almost  immediately  follow 
these,  the  error  lies  not  in  the  translation  but  in 
two  words  which  have  crept  into  the  text  and 
which  in  the  judgment  of  the  best  modern  authori- 
ties should  be  removed  from  it.  Their  removal 
gives  a  new  force  and  beauty  to  the  passage,  and 
as  it  now  stands,  it  suggests  an  important  and 
practical  train  of  thought.  As  it  appears  in  our 
Bibles  it  shows  us  one  of  the  disciples  flatly  contra- 
dicting the  Lord.  Jesus  says,  ^'Whither  I  go  ye 
know,"  and  Thomas  answers,  ^'We  know  not 
whither  Thou  goest."  He  had  supposed  that  the 
Messiah,  when  He  came,  was  to  abide  forever  on 
the  earth,  to  restore  the  kingdom  to  Israel,  to  re- 
establish the  throne  of  David  at  Jerusalem,  and  to 
extend  His  sway  over  all  the  nations.  But  Christ 
had  told  them  that  He  must  go  away,  and  that 
they  could  not  follow  Him  at  once.  He  had 
spoken  to  them  of  a  home,  which  He  had  called 
His  Father's  house,  in  which  were  many  dwell- 
ing-places, where  He  would  prepare  a  place  for 
them  and  into  which  by  and  by  He  would  receive 
them.     And   He   adds,    ^'Whither  I  go  ye  know 


The  Place  and  the  Way        253 

the  way."  He  does  not  say  "  Ye  know  whither  I 
am  going,"  for  that,  as  Thomas  testifies,  they  did 
not  know.  But  the  way  was  plain  to  them,  though 
the  point  to  which  it  led  was  still  beyond  their 
sight.  Then  it  is  that  the  slow  and  cautious  mind 
of  the  disciple,  lingering  bewildered  over  the 
picture  of  a  royal  palace  far  away,  so  different 
from  that  which  his  fancy  had  painted  as  the 
future  home  of  the  Messiah,  replies,  "But  Lord, 
we  do  not  even  know  whither  Thou  art  going ;  how 
then  do  we  know  the  way  ?  First  tell  us  plainly 
where  Thy  future  abode  shall  be,  and  then  per- 
chance we  may  discover  the  path  which  will  lead 
us  also  to  it."  There  is  at  once  instruction  and 
reproof  in  our  Lord's  reply,  *'0  thou  honest  but 
narrow  soul,  hast  thou  not  learned  that  I  am  the 
way?  I  came  forth  from  the  Father,  and  I  am 
going  again  to  the  Father.  That  is  all  ye  need  to 
know,  and  ye  would  have  known  it,  if  ye  had 
known  Me  for  what  I  am.  To  be  with  the  Father 
is  heaven  for  Me,  for  you,  for  every  human  soul, 
and  no  man  cometh  unto  the  Father  but  by  Me. 
The  fulness  of  meaning  that  My  words  contain,  it 
is  not  in  human  power  to  conceive.  No  mortal 
eye  hath  seen  or  can  see  the  glories  that  are  re- 
served for  the  children  of  God.  Not  upon  any 
earthly  hills,  shadowed  by  clouds  and  swept  by 
storms,  do  the  walls  and  towers  of  the  New  Jerusa- 
lem stand  in  their  divine  strength  and  beauty. 
And  not  even  in  thought  can  ye  follow  Me  now  to 


254  Life  Indeed 

that  realm  of  joy  and  peace  which  is  so  soon  to 
open  its  gates  of  pearl  to  My  ascending  spirit.  It 
is  enough  for  you  to  know  that  it  is  My  Father's 
house.  He  is  its  light  and  life  and  glory,  and 
wherever  He  is,  there  is  heaven.  To  Him  even 
now  ye  may  draw  near  through  Me,  and  through 
Me  alone.  Cease  then  from  your  idle  and  vain 
inquiry,  *  Whither  goest  thou  ? '  and  let  not  your 
hearts  be  troubled,  because  though  ye  know  not 
whither  I  am  going,  ye  know  that  I  am  the  way." 

The  question  of  Thomas  is  one  which  it  is  nat- 
ural for  us  all  to  ask.  Our  lips  shape  themselves 
more  easily  to  the  word  ''Whither?"  than  to  the 
word  *'  How?  "  We  too  are  apt  to  ask  it,  as  he 
did,  concerning  what  we  call  the  future  world,  the 
world  beyond  the  grave.  We  carry  the  idea  of 
space,  which  is  so  inwrought  into  all  our  thinking, 
and  the  material  conditions  with  which  we  are  now 
so  familiar,  into  our  reveries  and  our  speculations 
concerning  the  life  of  the  soul  hereafter.  We  are 
accustomed  to  think  of  heaven  as  a  place  far  above 
us  and  far  before  us,  and  our  curious  minds  vex 
themselves  with  the  endeavor  to  bring  it  near  and 
make  it  real  to  our  thought.  We  strive  to  form 
some  definite  image  of  the  spiritual  body,  which  is 
appropriate  to  it,  and  of  the  activities  and  enjoy- 
ments which  belong  to  that  higher  realm  of  being. 
We  try  to  follow  the  vanished  forms  of  those  who 
have  gone  from  us  into  the  eternal  silence,  and  to 
imagine  the  scenes  amid  which  they  are  now  mov- 


The  Place  and  the  Way         255 

ing.  How  often,  as  we  have  stood  by  the  bedside 
of  one  who  was  dying,  while  the  winter  storm  was 
beating  against  the  windows  of  the  hushed  and 
darkened  room,  have  we  thought  with  a  shudder 
of  the  long  and  lonely  journey  that  lay  before  the 
gentle  soul,  which  was,  as  we  are  wont  to  say, 
about  to  take  its  flight.  Somewhere  in  the  vague 
realms  of  air  above  us,  beyond  the  clouds,  beyond 
the  stars,  but  O,  how  far  from  our  aching  hearts, 
is  the  city  that  hath  imperishable  foundations,  the 
ever-blooming  Paradise  of  God.  There,  we  are 
sure,  they  are  at  rest,  whose  earthly  toil  and  strife 
are  over;  their  feet  have  touched  the  golden 
threshold,  their  eyes  have  seen  the  King  in  His 
beauty,  their  voices  are  chiming  in  the  seraphic 
song.  But  O,  if  the  mists  that  surround  us  could 
be  parted  for  an  instant,  so  that  we  might  once 
more  behold  them  and  know  whither  they  have 
gone  !  And  so  when  we  think  of  that  last  hour, 
which  is  so  certainly  and  so  swiftly  drawing  near  to 
each  of  us,  when  we  too  must  leave  the  places  and 
the  friends  that  we  have  known  so  well,  and  go 
forth  into  the  silent  land,  how  eagerly  we  long  for 
some  more  precise  knowledge  of  that  which  we  are 
there  to  find  !  Shall  we  pass  at  once  to  the  house 
not  made  with  hands,  when  this  frail  earthly  tent  is 
broken  up  ?  Or  shall  the  departing  spirit  wander 
off,  like  some  lonely  bird,  higher  and  higher  through 
the  cold  and  empty  spaces  of  the  universe,  till  at 
last  it  sees  in  the  distance  above  it  the  far-shinine: 


256  Life  Indeed 

splendors  of  its  celestial  mansion,  and  folds  its 
weary  wings  in  the  safe  shelter  of  the  immortal 
home  !  The  fear  of  death  by  which  many  Chris- 
tian hearts  are  haunted,  is  not  the  fear  that  they 
shall  fall  under  the  displeasure  of  God  and  be 
banished  from  His  presence  ;  they  are  confident  of 
His  forgiving  mercy  and  love.  It  is  the  natural 
dread  of  the  mystery  which  involves  the  beginning 
of  the  future  life ;  the  dread  of  the  passage  from 
one  world  to  the  other  ;  the  timidity  which  springs 
from  the  belief  that  there  is  a  vast  interval  between 
them,  and  that  the  soul  at  death  must  traverse  this, 
not  knowing  whither  it  is  going. 

But  all  such  fears  arise,  it  seems  to  me,  from  a 
false  conception  of  the  spiritual  world.  We  forget 
that  ''flesh  and  blood  cannot  inherit  the  kingdom 
of  God '  *  and  that  the  familiar  imagery  which  we 
use  in  describing  it,  which  pictures  it  to  us  as  a 
new  earth,  and  not  something  wholly  different  from 
the  earth,  is  only  misleading  if  it  is  literally  under- 
stood. There  can  hardly  be  an  error  more  com- 
plete than  when  men  fix  upon  some  distant  star  and 
say,  "There  is  heaven,"  or  imagine  that  in  the 
ages  of  the  future  this  rocky  ball  on  which  we  now 
are  living  is  to  be  purified  by  fire  and  made  the 
eternal  home  of  the  spirits  of  the  blessed.  If  the 
spiritual  world  is  composed  of  material  elements, 
like  the  visible  universe  which  now  surrounds  us, 
then  there  is  a  sharply  defined  boundary  between 
them,  and  the  one  ends  at  least  where  the  other 


The  Place  and  the  Way         257 

begins.  Two  material  bodies  or  systems  of  bodies 
certainly  cannot  occupy  the  same  space,  and  heaven 
cannot  encroach  upon  earth.  Then  we  must  pass 
beyond  the  orbits  of  Saturn  and  of  Sirius,  beyond 
the  faintest  fleck  of  light  that  shines  in  the  misty 
nebula  of  Orion,  before  we  can  reach  the  sapphire 
walls  and  enter  through  the  pearly  gates  to  the 
glory  that  no  mortal  eye  hath  seen.  Then  there  is 
before  our  souls  an  inconceivably  long  and  desolate 
journey,  and  the  spirits  of  those  whom  we  have 
lost  are  removed  to  an  immeasurable  distance  from 
us. 

But  did  it  never  occur  to  you,  when  you  have 
had  such  views  of  heaven,  when  you  have  shrunk 
back  in  dismay  from  the  shore  of  that  dim  and  un- 
known sea  on  which  you  also  must  by  and  by 
launch  out  into  the  darkness, — did  it  never  occur 
to  you  that  if  these  thoughts  are  true,  you  have 
shut  out  God  from  the  universe  in  which  His  chil- 
dren are  now  dwelling  ?  *'  Heaven  is,"  said  Jesus, 
'*My  Father's  house;  I  am  going  to  the  Father." 
Its  glory  and  its  joy  are  in  the  manifested  presence 
of  God,  in  the  unclouded  vision  of  His  face,  in 
perfect  and  immortal  sympathy  with  Him.  It  is 
not  a  region  of  sensuous  delights,  a  garden  whose 
flowers  never  fade,  a  temple  whose  worship  never 
ceases.  The  sea  of  glass  that  is  mingled  with  fire, 
the  song  of  the  hundred  and  forty-four  thousand, 
the  tree  of  life  whose  leaves  are  for  the  healing  of 
the  nations — it  is  all  a  magnificent,  inspired  sym- 


258  Life  Indeed 

holism,  to  lift  our  thought  to  a  higher  state  of  be- 
ing, in  which  the  glorified  human  spirit  shall  come 
into  a  new  and  near  relation  to  the  Divine  Spirit. 
But  that,  and  that  alone,  is  heaven.  To  be  with 
God,  in  constant,  vivid,  joyful  fellowship,  to  lose 
our  separate  wills  in  His  will,  to  be  so  mastered 
and  possessed  by  Him  that  our  life  shall  be  con- 
sciously a  part  of  His  life,  that  He  shall  be  in  us 
and  we  in  Him,  so  that  whether  we  are  in  the 
body  or  out  of  the  body  we  shall  neither  know  nor 
care,  because  God  shall  be  to  us  all  in  all, — that  is, 
if  we  may  trust  the  Scriptures,  the  essence  of  the 
heavenly  felicity.  It  is  for  the  human  soul  to  enter 
into  immediate  and  immortal  communion  with  the 
Divine  Spirit.     It  is  to  "  go  to  the  Father." 

But  now  with  this,  time  and  space  and  the  laws 
of  matter  have  nothing  to  do.  It  may  be  realized, 
partially  at  least,  wherever  God  and  the  soul  are 
found,  wherever  God  manifests  Himself  to  the 
human  soul.  Heaven  is  not  a  locality,  to  be 
sought  somewhere  beyond  the  boundaries  of  the 
sensible  universe ;  it  is  a  character,  an  experience, 
a  life.  And  it  may  as  well  be  here  as  anywhere, — 
among  us  and  around  us  as  well  as  millions  of 
miles  away.  It  is  not  a  foreign  country ;  it  is  a 
new  condition.  Among  the  material  objects  of 
which  the  universe  is  made  up,  whose  constitutions 
we  can  analyze  and  whose  movements  we  can 
trace,  we  find  an  invisible,  impalpable,  spiritual 
being,  with  capacities  that  are  not  limited  by  its 


The  Place  and  the  Way        259 

sensible  environment,  and  powers  whose  action  is 
not  governed  by  physical  laws.  It  is  the  immortal 
soul  of  man.  And  over  it  there  is  another  spirit, 
of  whose  existence  it  alone  has  knowledge,  to  which 
it  feels  itself  akin,  a  spirit  of  infinite  power  and 
purity,  of  light  and  truth,  of  life  and  grace.  It 
cannot  be  discerned  by  the  organs  of  sense ;  the 
eye  does  not  behold  its  glory,  the  human  ear  does 
not  hear  its  voice.  The  soul  alone  can  apprehend 
it ;  but  to  the  soul  it  is  real  and  near.  And  now  it 
is  when  these  two  spiritual  beings,  God  and  the 
soul,  come  together,  in  harmony  and  love,  that  the 
heavenly  experience  begins.  The  soul  is  then  like 
a  wandering  star  that  has  found  its  true  orbit,  like 
a  wayward  child  that  has  returned  to  its  home.  It 
forgets,  for  the  time,  the  physical  conditions  in 
which  it  is  imprisoned,  as  the  artist  in  communion 
even  with  the  ideal  images  which  are  only  the 
creatures  of  his  fancy,  may  forget  his  hunger  and 
poverty  and  pain.  It  has  escaped  from  the  lower 
and  material  world  into  the  higher,  spiritual  sphere 
which  is  the  realm  in  which  it  is  fitted  to  dwell. 
The  claims  of  the  body,  the  exigencies  of  the 
temporal,  material,  visible,  soon  bring  it  back 
within  the  earthly  limitations,  but  in  such  an  hour 
it  has  had  a  foretaste  of  the  heavenly  experience. 
For  a  little  time,  at  least,  it  has  been  ''  with  the 
Father." 

Now  the  higher  and  purer  the  character  becomes, 
the  more  frequent  and  the  more  perfect  becomes 


260  Life  Indeed 

this  experience.  The  soul  may  gain — as  some 
human  souls  have  gained  it — a  constant  sense  of 
God's  presence  and  love,  an  abiding  peace,  a  con- 
tinual communion.  It  must  always  still  be  incom- 
plete, so  long  as  the  earthly  prison-house  detains 
us,  so  long  as  the  earthly  temptations  hedge  us 
round.  Yet  even  here  it  is  possible  for  us  to  live  a 
life  which  is  truly  described  as  a  life  '*in  God." 
And  the  joy  and  peace  and  victory  of  such  a  life  is 
more  than  the  pledge,  it  is  the  literal  beginning  of 
heaven.  And  this,  it  seems  to  me,  is  what  the 
Saviour  meant  when  He  said,  '<  I  am  in  the  Father 
and  the  Father  in  Me."  He  was  still  in  the  world, 
when  He  uttered  these  words,  compassed  by  its 
infirmities,  burdened  by  its  sorrows,  in  contact 
with  its  sin ;  but  already,  in  the  perfect  accord  of 
His  own  will  with  the  will  of  God,  in  the  free 
and  uninterrupted  communion  of  His  spirit  with 
the  spirit  of  God,  He  was  ever  in  ^'His  Father's 
house."  What  then  was  death  to  Him?  It  was 
not  the  beginning  of  a  long  journey,  in  which  His 
soul  was  to  be  borne  beyond  the  rim  of  the  material 
universe.  It  was  merely  the  falling  away  of  every- 
thing that  had  hindered  and  hampered  His  inter- 
course with  God.  <<  I  am  going  away,"  He  said, 
*'  because  My  body,  through  which  alone  I  am 
visible  to  you,  will  soon  pass  from  among  you. 
But  I  am  with  the  Father  already,  and  then  I  shall 
only  be  more  perfectly  and  forever  with  Him. 
Nothing  will  be  changed  to  Me,  except  that  My 


The  Place  and  the  Way        261 

soul  will  have  shaken  off  the  fetters  of  the  flesh. 
Nothing  will  be  changed  to  you,  except  that  for  a 
little  while  ye  shall  not  see  Me  with  your  eyes  or 
touch  Me  with  your  hands.  But  I  am  with  you 
always,  in  a  spiritual  fellowship,  and  I  shall  by  and 
by  receive  you  to  Myself,  when  the  death  of  the 
body  shall  at  last  set  free  your  souls." 

And  that,  and  nothing  more,  my  Christian 
friends,  is  what  death  means  to  you  and  me.  The 
spiritual  world  is  not  far  from  us,  it  is  all  around 
us.  It  is  not  separated  by  a  deep  abyss  from  the 
world  of  material  objects  and  of  physical  energies ; 
it  pervades  and  permeates  this,  as  the  sunlight  fills 
the  air.  We  are  in  it  now ;  it  is  the  realm  in  which 
our  souls  are  living.  It  is  in  it  that  we  are  brought 
into  contact  and  communion  with  God,  and  become 
aware  of  His  presence,  as  He  manifests  Himself 
not  to  the  outward  eye  but  to  the  spiritual  sense. 
But  meanwhile  we  are  also  living  another  life  under 
physical  conditions,  in  common  with  the  beasts  that 
perish.  From  this,  death  sets  us  free,  and  then  the 
life  of  the  soul  goes  on  forever.  The  transition 
from  a  sphere  in  which  sense  and  spirit  are  blended, 
to  one  which  is  spiritual  only, — from  one  in  which 
our  perception  of  God  is  dim  and  partial  to  one  in 
which  it  is  complete, — that  is  what  it  is  to  die.  If 
our  souls  are  now  in  friendship  and  harmony  with 
God,  so  that  to  come  into  perfect  communion  with 
Him  is  the  consummation  of  our  highest  human 
experience,  it  will  be  to  us  to  pass  from  earth  to 


262  Life  Indeed 

heaven.  If  our  souls  are  now  at  enmity  with  Him, 
so  that  they  will  shrink  from  Him  in  terror  when 
they  are  no  longer  sheltered  from  Him  by  the 
barriers  which  now  enclose  them,  it  will  be  to  pass 
from  earth  to  hell.  If  there  are  no  real  walls  of 
sapphire  above  the  firmament,  there  is  also  no  literal 
lake  of  fire.  But  to  go  thus  to  the  Father,  is  heaven 
for  one  soul,  and  to  meet  God,  face  to  face,  spirit 
to  spirit,  is  hell  for  another. 

I  have  dwelt  thus  at  length  on  this  part  of  our 
Lord's  teaching,  because  it  seems  to  bring  His  doc- 
trine of  the  future  life  into  striking  accord  with  our 
best  thought  concerning  the  nature  of  the  soul.  We 
cannot  spare  His  figurative  description  of  the  con- 
dition of  the  glorified  spirit  hereafter.  The  man- 
sions of  the  Father's  house,  the  city  of  God,  whose 
length  and  breadth  and  height  are  equal,  the  streets 
of  gold,  the  gates  that  are  never  shut,  the  praising 
company  whose  robes  are  washed  white  in  the  blood 
of  the  Lamb, — no  physical  imagery  is  too  striking  or 
beautiful  to  set  forth  the  transcendent  spiritual  fact. 
But  if  we  ask  for  a  clearer  and  more  exact  state- 
ment of  the  truth  that  is  behind  the  symbol,  we  have 
it  here.  '*!  am  now  in  the  Father.  My  spiritual 
nature  is  even  now  in  constant  communion  with 
Him.  Yet  I  am  going  to  the  Father,  for  that  which 
here  on  earth  makes  this  communion  imperfect  is  to 
pass  away,  and  My  soul  will  then  live  its  own  life, 
unhampered  by  the  flesh.  Heaven  is  not  a  place 
to  which  My  emancipated  spirit  shall  ascend  ;   it  is 


The  Place  and  the  Way         263 

the  condition  in  which  My  spirit  will  be  found, 
when  it  is  emancipated  from  the  body ;  it  is  the 
purest  and  best  of  all  earthly  experiences  consum- 
mated and  made  immortal ;  it  is  to  be  consciously 
and  uninterruptedly  and  forever  with  God." 

But  if  this  is  so,  then  two  or  three  things  are 
made  very  plain.  The  first  is  that  the  Christian 
soul,  w^hich  already  knows  what  it  is  to  hold  such 
communion  with  God,  need  have  no  more  fear  of 
death  than  it  has  of  prayer.  Not  that  it  is  in  prayer 
only  that  we  realize  God's  presence  and  come  into 
sympathy  with  Him,  but  it  is  in  prayer  usually  that 
He  draws  nearest  us,  and  that  our  sense  of  His  be- 
ing and  His  love  is  most  vivid  and  most  joyful.  It 
is  especially  in  prayer  that  the  soul  seems  to  break 
away  from  all  its  earthly  limitations,  and  stand  in 
awe,  perhaps  in  rapture,  before  the  very  face  of  the 
Most  High.  And  that  is  why  prayer  is  the  loftiest 
experience  which  is  possible  for  the  human  soul. 
But  it  is  an  experience  which  death  only  intensifies 
and  perpetuates.  That  which  is  on  earth  occasional 
and  partial,  becomes  constant  and  complete,  and 
we  call  it  heaven.  It  is  the  celestial  felicity ;  it  is 
the  beatific  vision.  And  if  you  are  not  afraid  to 
lose  yourself,  as  we  say,  that  is  to  lose  the  con- 
sciousness of  your  physical  surroundings,  in  such  an 
overwhelming  sense  of  God's  presence,  you  need 
not  be  afraid  to  die.  If  such  moments  have  been 
to  you  the  moments  of  deepest  and  purest  happi- 
ness, if  it  is  then  that  you  have  seemed  to  live  the 


264  Life  Indeed 

largest  and  truest  life,  let  not  your  heart  be  troubled, 
for  you  have  already  stood  on  the  threshold  of  your 
heavenly  mansion,  and  for  you  to  die  will  only  be 
to  enter  in. 

So  too,  if  this  is  what  is  meant  by  heaven,  the 
supreme  importance  of  character  is  plain.  The 
chief  end  of  life  is  not  to  gain  admittance,  when  we 
die,  to  an  abode  of  endless  happiness,  to  pass  a  cer- 
tain line  and  feel  ourselves  secure.  It  is  to  acquire 
such  a  character  that  we  shall  rejoice  to  go  to  the 
Father,  that  we  shall  be  in  sympathy  with  Him, 
and  find  in  fellowship  with  Him  our  heaven.  Men 
sometimes  say,  <'The  descriptions  of  heaven  which 
are  given  in  the  Scriptures  do  not  attract  me.  The 
popular  Christian  conception  of  it,  as  a  place  where 
happy  saints  are  forever  singing  hymns  of  praise,  has 
no  charm,  no  reality  for  me."  Ah,  but  think  a 
moment,  and  you  will  see  that  that  is  not  it.  The 
time  will  come  when  your  body  will  perish  and  all 
your  earthly  interests  will  vanish  away.  And  the 
great  question  for  you  is.  What  is  the  character  of 
that  spiritual  nature  within  you  which  does  not  die 
— your  thoughts,  your  affections,  your  will — in  a 
single  word,  your  soul  ?  You  live  a  double  life  at 
present,  partly  physical,  partly  spiritual ;  take  the 
physical  away — death  will  soon  do  it  for  you — and 
what  have  you  left  ?  Is  your  heart  in  sympathy 
wth  God,  or  at  enmity  with  Him  ?  Or  is  He  not 
in  all  your  thoughts  ?  Remember  that  nothing  but 
what  you  are  can  go  over  with  you  from  the  phys- 


The  Place  and  the  Way        265 

ical  to  the  spiritual  realm  of  being,  not  because 
you  must  leave  it  all  behind  you  and  wander  off  to 
some  remote  planet,  but  because  you  are  already 
living  a  life  with  which  all  this  has  nothing  to  do. 
Your  houses  and  lands,  your  books  and  friends,  are 
not  a  part  of  you;  you  move  among  them,  the 
body  is  the  bond  which  unites  you  to  them.  But 
you  are  a  spirit,  and  the  spiritual  world  is  that  to 
which  you  rightfully  belong.  Now  then,  not  with 
what  earthly  associates,  but  with  what  spiritual  be- 
ings are  you  in  sympathy  ?  What  friends  will  re- 
ceive you,  and  find  you  fitted  for  their  society, 
when  you  are  lost  sight  of  by  your  earthly  friends  ? 
Will  you  meet  the  great  Spirit,  into  whose  presence 
you  pass,  as  one  whom  you  have  already  known 
and  loved,  or  one  whom  you  have  disregarded  or 
defied  ?  If  you  are  dissatisfied  with  what  you  call 
the  childish  pictures  which  the  Bible  paints  of  the 
Judgment  Day  and  that  which  follows  it,  take  the 
subject  up  out  of  the  region  of  metaphor  into  the 
most  abstract  realm  of  thought  that  you  can  reach ; 
let  us  use  words  with  the  utmost  precision,  and  tell 
me,  when  your  spiritual  nature  is  brought  by  death 
into  immediate  contact  with  the  infinite  Spirit,  will 
it  be  as  when  a  child  rushes  to  the  embrace  of  a 
father,  or  as  when  a  criminal  stands  trembling  be- 
fore his  judge?  That,  I  think,  is  what,  in  its 
simplest  terms,  it  is  to  be  saved  or  to  be  lost. 

And  finally,  how  clear,  in  the  light  of  what  has 
now  been  said,   is  the  meaning  of  the  Saviour's 


^66  Life  Indeed 

words,  *'  I  am  the  way."  He  is  the  way  to  heaven 
because  He  is  the  way  to  God ;  no  man  cometh 
unto  the  Father  but  by  Him,  and  to  come  to  the 
Father  is  to  go  whither  He  has  gone.  In  language 
that  is  simpler  still,  it  is  by  Christ  that  we  are 
brought  into  harmony  with  God, — by  His  life,  by 
His  teachings,  by  His  death,  by  His  indwelling 
presence  in  our  souls.  It  is  in  Him  that  God  has 
come  near  to  us,  making  His  voice  audible  to  our 
ears,  making  His  glory  visible  before  our  eyes.  He 
that  hath  seen  Him  hath  seen  the  Father,  full  of 
grace  and  full  of  truth.  Out  of  that  spiritual  realm 
in  which  He  is  always  near  us  He  has  come  forth 
into  the  material  world,  and  under  mortal  condi- 
tions has  manifested  Himself  to  the  actual  percep- 
tion of  the  senses.  It  was  in  order  that  we  might 
be  without  excuse,  if  we  do  not  know  and  trust  and 
love  Him.  In  the  historic,  human  Jesus,  He  has 
shown  Himself  to  the  incarnate  human  soul ;  and 
He  has  shown  us  also  how  such  a  soul  may  live  in 
fellowship  with  the  spiritual  world.  He  removed 
in  His  atoning  death,  the  great  barrier  of  unfor- 
given  sin  which  hindered  the  free  approach  of  the 
soul  of  man  to  God.  And  now  in  this  twofold 
sense  He  says,  *'  I  am  the  way  !  Make  My  sacrifice 
your  own,  and  God  will  receive  you.  Live  as  I 
have  lived,  follow  Me,  and  you  may  have  a  con- 
scious, continuing  fellowship  with  Him.  Believe  Me 
that  I  am  in  the  Father,  and  come  to  the  Father 
through  Me.     So  shall  you  gain  that  knowledge  of 


The  Place  and  the  Way        267 

God  which  is  Hfe  eternal,  that  spiritual  communion 
with  Him  which  is  the  foretaste  of  heaven.  And 
by  and  by  I  will  come  again,  and  receive  you  into 
that  richer  experience,  that  clearer  vision,  which 
is  its  consummation." 

We  have  learned  that  in  the  kingdom  of  nature 
there  are  no  sudden  leaps  or  breaks,  but  only  steady 
and  continuous  development.  It  will  be  well  for 
us  when  we  learn  that  the  same  thing  is  true  of  the 
kingdom  of  God.  No  man  will  be  suddenly  thrust 
into  heaven  through  the  open  door  of  death.  We 
must  enter  heaven  here  on  earth,  if  we  are  to  enter 
it  at  all. 


Princeton  Theoloaical ,  Sf mjnj'7,,  ySJ,'' 


1    1012  01248  8278 


